A38 in Cornwall Petition

[cornishcreature]

A local road safety campaign group called SAFE38 have recently launched a petition to call for the inclusion of dualling the A38 Saltash to Trerulefoot section of the A38 in South East Cornwall within the RIS2 period. There were plans to dual all the single carriageway sections in the 1990s but were cancelled in 1994 as part of a spending review. The group want to see all the remaining single carriageway sections bypassed and made to dual carriageway and junction improvements on the old 1970s section of dual carriageway between Catchfrench and Liskeard. This follows the recent 'Case for Action' that was developed by a cross party group calling for improvements from Exeter to Bodmin to create a high quality route to stimulate economic growth and improve safety.

The petition can be found here if anyone wants to sign it. https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/233970

[nowster]

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https://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/society/about.php

[nowster]

To be honest, filling the gap in the A30 either side of Truro is of a much higher priority.

[cornishcreature]

The A30 between Carland and Chiverton is a higher priority which is why construction starts by March 2020 and should be complete by the end of 2022. After that the A38 should be the next big project in Cornwall as its safety record is far worse and economic gains will be felt by all the SW. There's a nice fly through video of the A30 project here. Check out the green bridge at around 3:25.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sljDLtii-GU

[nowster]

How much traffic crosses the Tamar? Would you be campaigning for the bridge tolls to be abolished too?

[DavidBrown]

The problem the A38 has is just how much of it needs improving. The A30 has the bonus of having its plans to upgrade the most sub-standard section very far advanced, and really the rest of it isn't that bad - yes it would ideally be dualled past Hayle, but at that point I would personally agree and say sorting out the A38 then takes priority.

Dualling Saltash to Trerulefoot would be the logical place to start, but what about west of Dobwalls? The Glynn Valley is arguably a bigger problem with the amount it's closed, but bypassing it isn't easy - you could go south and re-route and improve the A390 at the same time, but then face a long detour to avoid the Lanhydrock estate, meaning no benefits to Bodmin. Or go north, again with a long detour to avoid Cardinham woods, and no benefit for A390 traffic.

Plus if the whole lot was one day dualled, would that cause a bottleneck at the Saltash Tunnel/Tamar Bridge, which would be a major headache to try and solve?

[Norfolktolancashire]

There was a topic on this part of the A38 earlier last year.

(apologies, no idea how to link this)



viewtopic.php?f=1&t=39245&start=20&hilit=A38

[cornishcreature]

About 50,000 vehicles use the Tamar Bridge each day. Ultimately that needs a second crossing to the North. I recently travelled the A9 in Northern Spain. Shows what modern engineering can do. Dobwalls - Bodmin. The route in the 1990s went to the South of the A38 out of the valley and dropped back in by the station. I would imagine this is route that would be taken as really no other feasible route. This would provide a bypass effectively of East, Middle and West Taphouse as a bonus. Check out the A390 bridge over the railway line to the West of Dobwalls in the attached picture. That certainly looks like its been built with future dualling in mind as there was no real need to build it as wide as this for purely a single carriageway road. When they built the Dobwalls Bypass in 2008 they consulted the old 1990s route and followed it except at its western end to avoid Doublebois so the engineers must have planned this in with future aspirations in mind.

[Berk]

Yes, that’s basically how I’d imagined it would work too. Start off by building a straight link from Saltash Tunnel to Trerulefoot/Catchfrench.

Borrow some of the A390 route (guess that means it would resume further west, just before the Bodmin turn). Bypass East and Middle Taphouse. Not sure whether West Taphouse could also be bypassed, but it may be possible.

Despite this route being better, I could still see some tunnelling involved (probably close by West Taphouse and nearer to Colesloggett). I guess it remains to be seen how much of the road should be W/S2 and how much D2.