Leicester Eastern Bypass

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jackal
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Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by jackal »

LCC have very tentative plans for a new bypass from the A46 at Syston around to the M1 between J20 and J21 (source).

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The bypass is also referred to in this map from the Midlands Connect Strategy:
Midlands Connect Resilience - Copy.PNG
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by roadtester »

Interesting - is it supposed to be an alternative to improving M69/A46 to the west of Leicester, perhaps even becoming the new A46 corridor itself, or is it something that stands alone in its own right? The imprecision of the lines/arrows on the two different maps gives slightly different messages about that.

I'd have thought a lot of the requirement would go away if the M69/M1/A46 side of things was sorted out.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Bryn666 »

Beware... is this is a strategic corridor or just a way to expand the city to the east...?
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by jedikiah »

It took Leicestershire County Council over 50 years to construct the distributer level of ring road to about 85% notwithstanding this was in the main done to a much lesser standard than envisaged in the 1930s when the land was reserved. The gap is in the south east quadrant, between Oadby and Humberstone. Part of the missing link - Goodwood Road - was actually built as early as the 1970s, before much of the rest had been started on but since it peters out on a T junction at Spencefield Lane it isn't signed. The ELDR completion was only finally killed off in the 1990s, but by then development had already more or less taken over the available space.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Stevie D »

roadtester wrote:Interesting - is it supposed to be an alternative to improving M69/A46 to the west of Leicester, perhaps even becoming the new A46 corridor itself, or is it something that stands alone in its own right? The imprecision of the lines/arrows on the two different maps gives slightly different messages about that.
It's hard to see that it would be intended to replace the existing A46 corridor north of the city (particularly as it wouldn't connect with M69). The existing route is about as direct as you can sensibly get, and – apart from the TOTSO roundabout at Syston – it is now fully GSJ'd and in my experience flows pretty well.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

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Stevie D wrote:
roadtester wrote:Interesting - is it supposed to be an alternative to improving M69/A46 to the west of Leicester, perhaps even becoming the new A46 corridor itself, or is it something that stands alone in its own right? The imprecision of the lines/arrows on the two different maps gives slightly different messages about that.
It's hard to see that it would be intended to replace the existing A46 corridor north of the city (particularly as it wouldn't connect with M69). The existing route is about as direct as you can sensibly get, and – apart from the TOTSO roundabout at Syston – it is now fully GSJ'd and in my experience flows pretty well.
But the second chart is much more suggestive of the new road being part of the A46 corridor than the first.

At the very least, there's presumably a lot of number crunching needed to work out what impact the two possible upgrades - west and east of Leicester - would have. They must be highly inter-dependent, I'd have thought.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Berk »

You’re missing the main point: which is that particularly hard to cross Leicester - particularly if approaching from the east, or to get from east to south/north.

Ah, but what about the A563 you say?? It’s just not up to the job. It’s roundabout strewn, not fully widened, and basically trying to do the job that this road is meant to, whilst acting as a middle ring as well.

If I could put it in terms you understand - imagine if the M66 extension hadn’t been built?? Or the M65 (and so on). It’s a gap in the network that needs filling.

It’ll also make it a damned sight easier to access the M1/M6 from somewhere like Peterborough without having to use the A14. It’d knock at least 15 mins off the first leg of the journey to the motorway.

And it could quite possibly reduce a good amount of traffic entering the central ring road too.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Stevie D »

Berk wrote:You’re missing the main point: which is that particularly hard to cross Leicester - particularly if approaching from the east, or to get from east to south/north.
Don't get me wrong, I wasn't saying that the road isn't needed, but I would envisage it more as a local-ish road to connect A47E and A6S with M1, M69 and A46, rather than being a strategic route between M1 and A46N.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Berk »

That may well be the case, but I believe its use would grow in time - or quite possibly right from the start. When most other local roads are unclassified, the Leicestershire wolds are a bit of a roads desert really.

My Dad would quite probably have used this road. He worked in Syston for 10 years; when his office relocated to central Leicester, most of his clients were still in the Syston/Melton area.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by M19 »

If it's a local scheme, it's likely to be a crappy S2 with lots of roundabouts. Even with D2, roundabouts will make progress tortuous, and it will be congested. You only need to try driving the A1237 York Outer Ring Road to see what happens when you underengineer a road like that.

There is a big opportunity to promote this route for an M69/A46 expressway corridor. It offers a key opportunity to bypass the east of Leicester properly. Even better it will take traffic of J21. It's a big bottleneck, which is no surprise when it's the only real connection into Leicester from the M1, and has the M69 slamming into it for good measure. The multiplex between J21 and J21A is awful for congestion, or at best dodgy weaving. The opportunity to run the M69 parallel up to the A46 would be the only way round this, but the development of an urban extension at Lubbersthorpe on the west side of the M1 has killed that off.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Johnathan404 »

The rumours I've heard is that there is an aspiration to widen J21-23a.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

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Johnathan404 wrote:The rumours I've heard is that there is an aspiration to widen J21-23a.
It will be turned into Smart Motorway, contractors are tendering now. I believe it will be divided into two schemes, 19-21 and 21-23a.

I can't remember the source but I'm sure I read that the Eastern Bypass would be a NSL D2 with grade-separated junctions - basically a mirror of the existing A46. The problem is the current A46 grinds to a halt particularly in the evening rush hour between the M1 and A607 - to try and "bypass" it with an inferior road would be stupid. It is expected that new developments would be fed from the arterial routes or dedicated GSJ's.

A long-term problem for the city council has been that the eastern side of the city suffers economically due to having poor access to the rest of the trunk road network - partially helped by the A607 & A46 but not great. The A6 from Kettering gets very busy but comes crashing into the urban area with nowhere to distribute the traffic well. The A46 northern bypass allowed lots of new housing to be be built in Glenfield, Groby, Anstey, Birstall and Beaumont Leys - the eastern bypass will replicate this.

There has been an aspiration to build an M1 J20a - originally where the A426 cross the M1 (and dual the A426 up to the Blaby bypass)- to provide better access to the villages on the southern urban fringe, which have all had masses of new housing in the last thirty years but no new roads - the B4114 and B582 are stationary most rush hour evenings. The new eastern bypass plan achieves this objective but does it better with a dedicated junction and new road construction to better distribute traffic.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by M19 »

Johnathan404 wrote:The rumours I've heard is that there is an aspiration to widen J21-23a.
Doesn't solve the weaving issue, or the problem of traffic queuing southbound to come off at J21, interrupting the flow on the M1. This isn't helped by drivers using the outer lanes and looking for a gap closer to the off slip for J21.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by poshbakerloo »

I bet they regret building that housing estate at the A46 - A607 roundabout, its exactly in the way - which I am sure was the plan.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Derek »

To be really useful and to avoid a huge detour the road needs to run from somewhere near Uppingham to the M1/M69 junction. A good idea traffic wise, but a terrible idea for the lovely countryside it would destroy.

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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Bryn666 »

Nothing some carefully considered green bridges and earthworks can't mitigate though. Roads don't necessarily have to trash the countryside, it's ones like the NNDR that exist purely to fuel car based housing sprawl that we need to be wary of.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Alderpoint »

Johnathan404 wrote:The rumours I've heard is that there is an aspiration to widen J21-23a.
J21-21a is already 4 lanes and widening that more through Leicester services is going to be hard. In theory they could close the services and move it elsewhere which would reduce the amount of weaving involved but I think that unlikely.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by Truvelo »

I would desperately like to see something done to the east of Leicester. Getting from the A47 is a right pain and involves ratrunning through either Scraptoft of Keyham to join the A46 at Syston. However, I'm not keen on local authority schemes. Anything like the A1237 or A4174 will just be as tedious as the current arrangements.

What is the timescale of this proposal? Will it be open to traffic before I retire?
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by darkcape »

Truvelo wrote: What is the timescale of this proposal? Will it be open to traffic before I retire?
When do you retire :P Probably ten years to opening at least?
Alderpoint wrote: J21-21a is already 4 lanes and widening that more through Leicester services is going to be hard. In theory they could close the services and move it elsewhere which would reduce the amount of weaving involved but I think that unlikely.
The Mercury reported it could be moved to the new J20a. However a previous aspiration by the council was to add north-facing slips to the M1 at J21a, and build a new LFE services there that would still serve the M1 and M69/A46 traffic. In 2007 when the HA consulted on the M69-M1 link there were objections to closing LFE and redeveloping Markfield because the passing traffic levels were lower and operators would not want that.
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Re: Leicester Eastern Bypass

Post by jackal »

Truvelo wrote:However, I'm not keen on local authority schemes. Anything like the A1237 or A4174 will just be as tedious as the current arrangements.
Darkcape recalls reading that it would be GSJed D2 (see above).
What is the timescale of this proposal? Will it be open to traffic before I retire?
From the Leicester Mercury article:

'Sir Peter said detailed plans would be developed over the next 18 months.

Any final proposals would need both Government approval and funding.

Sir Peter added: “We are some way off but I would say this is a project for the next decade.”'
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