A45/A46 New GSJ Coventry

[SouthWest Philip]

Driving past Coventry yesterday, I was surprised to see that a new GSJ is at an advanced stage of construction on the A45 Stonebridge Highway between the Tollbar End and Strivichall Interchange junctions with the A46 N and S. A look on OpenStreetMap indicates that this junction will provide an additional access to an industrial estate alongside Coventry Airport. It is a full access junction westbound, but eastbound the exit will be from the Strivichall roundabout rather than A45 mainline.

Seems like a rather suboptimal location for another junction given that this section of road is already a busy multiplex between the A45 and A46 with significant weaving between those junctions. It will also add more complexity in providing free-flow for the A46 through Strivichall should that ever happen. But at least it isn't an at-grade roundabout!

[Bryn666]

Driving past Coventry yesterday, I was surprised to see that a new GSJ is at an advanced stage of construction on the A45 Stonebridge Highway between the Tollbar End and Strivichall Interchange junctions with the A46 N and S. A look on OpenStreetMap indicates that this junction will provide an additional access to an industrial estate alongside Coventry Airport. It is a full access junction westbound, but eastbound the exit will be from the Strivichall roundabout rather than A45 mainline.

Seems like a rather suboptimal location for another junction given that this section of road is already a busy multiplex between the A45 and A46 with significant weaving between those junctions. It will also add more complexity in providing free-flow for the A46 through Strivichall should that ever happen. But at least it isn't an at-grade roundabout!

Indeed, it's another developer-led car dependent disaster waiting to happen traffic flow wise, but at least the A45 remains largely unaffected.

[thatapanydude]

Just seen this on OSM and this is a disaster waiting to happen. The A46 is meant to be a strategic road between the M1, M6 and M40 and what we have is a silly little junction brining on commuter/local traffic to a part of a road which is a duplex with the A45 and between 2 major junction in the space of a mile where traffic will be weaving between the lanes.

Let’s hope that the slip roads are of a good standard and not compact. Whilst this is a developer funded scheme, isn’t the A46 Trunk and if so why have HE given sign off - terrible in my view.

[Alderpoint]

It's additional access into the Jaguar plant and thenew Whitely south (commercial) development. I've posted on here about it a number of times.

It is very sorely needed as the whole area is rammed around rush hour with traffic getting into/out of Jaguar at Whitley island, and into and out of the airport at Toll Bar.

[Truvelo]

Had the A45 not been trunk this new junction would have been a roundabout or a set of lights.

[Alderpoint]

Had the A45 not been trunk this new junction would have been a roundabout or a set of lights.

The strategy for the A46 corridor for many years has to get rid of all the at-grade roundabouts, e.g. Toll Bar, Coventry Junctions, so I really don't think JLR (who are paying for this) would have got away with a flat junction.

Indeed all the publicity about this for may years was about building a new bridge to allow direct access between the JLR plant and the Whitley South expansion - this new juntion with the A45/6 was a relative late-comer.

[jackal]

The bad:

- Eastbound it can't be more than 500m from the merge to the tigertail for Stonebridge Island. Other weaving spaces are not much better.
- Extra arm at Festival Island, potentially increasing congestion
- This also rules out a filter lane in NE corner.
- May complicate long term upgrades such as widening

In mitigation:

- There is presently an even tighter weaving space eastbound from the school access (which I assume will be replaced by the new arrangement)
- It's already a 50mph road so the weaving should not require a lower speed limit
- Probably doesn't interfere with a future direct connector for nb to eb at Festival Island (do we have historical plans for this?)
- The big one, some traffic presently using adjacent junctions such as Stonebridge Island will be rerouted to the new GSJ, reducing congestion

The impact on Festival Island is unclear - on the one hand, the eastbound entry to the site is from the island, on the other hand, A45 traffic that presently has to turn at the island to get to the existing JLR GSJ can directly access the new GSJ instead. I would guess overall traffic on the island should be slightly reduced.

tl;dr I'd say it should make things better for Stonebridge Island, maybe a bit better for Festival Island, and a bit worse for the mainline. It should have been built with C/D lanes but it's still far from the worse development access I've seen.

PS: how often does a GSJ get this far into construction before SABRE notices it?!

[Bryn666]

I'm sure it has been raised before but as it doesn't involve a cycle lane or speed limit reduction it doesn't generate a huge thread by the usual suspects complaining how the world is ruined

[Alderpoint]

PS: how often does a GSJ get this far into construction before SABRE notices it?!

Mentioned it over a year ago:

The "Whitley South" expansion between JLR and the airport in Coventry is now progressing beyond all the earth moving they've been doing for the last few years.

The supporting pillars are now installed for the new bridge over the A45, and the main supporting beams for the bridge are sitting nearby, waiting to be lifted into place - this will require the A45 to be shut during this process, but not seen any announcement of when this is likely to happen.

[ChrisH]

Overall this looks like as positive a development as we could expect, in that the strategic route is (sort of) protected from further delay. I'd like to think that a really forward thinking strategy for the A46 would be thinking about all this in the round and examining how much extra local traffic is desired vs. the strategic nature of the route...

[jackal]

PS: how often does a GSJ get this far into construction before SABRE notices it?!

Mentioned it over a year ago:

The "Whitley South" expansion between JLR and the airport in Coventry is now progressing beyond all the earth moving they've been doing for the last few years.

The supporting pillars are now installed for the new bridge over the A45, and the main supporting beams for the bridge are sitting nearby, waiting to be lifted into place - this will require the A45 to be shut during this process, but not seen any announcement of when this is likely to happen.

I'm sure you knew there was a GSJ afoot but that post doesn't say as much.

[ravenbluemoon]

- There is presently an even tighter weaving space eastbound from the school access (which I assume will be replaced by the new arrangement)

It does look like the school playing fields access is off the new slip roads, so the current access will be closed. Oddly I never noticed that entrance before the upgrade. It did exist, further along, but to a very low standard.

[jackal]

- There is presently an even tighter weaving space eastbound from the school access (which I assume will be replaced by the new arrangement)

It does look like the school playing fields access is off the new slip roads, so the current access will be closed. Oddly I never noticed that entrance before the upgrade. It did exist, further along, but to a very low standard.

Even though it was closer to Toll Bar End it was easy to miss as there was an access to a farm and a give way from Stonehouse Lane even closer to the roundabout. It wasn't really laid out as a strategic road at all.

Once upon a time Stonehouse Lane extended across the A46, and even had its own roundabout (see OS 1:25,000 1950s on SABRE maps). I think upgrade works may be visible in this 1945 aerial photography via Google Earth:

[danfw194]

Unless I'm mistaken, the extra exit on Festival Island is going to need another traffic light sequence, which will bottle up more traffic in that NE corner of the island. But as others have pointed out, there are some potentially decent mitigating factors for flows elsewhere.

[Micro The Maniac]

Unless I'm mistaken, the extra exit on Festival Island is going to need another traffic light sequence, which will bottle up more traffic in that NE corner of the island. But as others have pointed out, there are some potentially decent mitigating factors for flows elsewhere.

I think there is only an exit FROM Festival Island... so the existing sequences should be OK?

[danfw194]

Unless I'm mistaken, the extra exit on Festival Island is going to need another traffic light sequence, which will bottle up more traffic in that NE corner of the island. But as others have pointed out, there are some potentially decent mitigating factors for flows elsewhere.

I think there is only an exit FROM Festival Island... so the existing sequences should be OK?

Ah yes of course, that's right by the looks of things.

[Alderpoint]

Navigating Festival Island a few days ago, new signs are up on the approaches with the new exit being signposted to the airport - clearly indicating they are hoping the new junction will take some traffic off (the still over-loaded) Toll Bar End.

The signs may all be there, but the exit isn't going to be open for a while as the road currently lacks any blacktop.

[mattling]

The new GSJ isn’t open yet, nor the new exit off Festival island, but new lights are now operational on Festival Island including at the end of the A45W off slip meaning that the free flow from A45W to A46S is no more. So there are now additional phases at the NE and SE corner of Festival Island. Queues are now common at times of the day when everything used to flow freely. I haven’t used the Island at peak times yet, but I can only imagine it’s not pretty.

[SouthWest Philip]

The new GSJ isn’t open yet, nor the new exit off Festival island, but new lights are now operational on Festival Island including at the end of the A45W off slip meaning that the free flow from A45W to A46S is no more. So there are now additional phases at the NE and SE corner of Festival Island. Queues are now common at times of the day when everything used to flow freely. I haven’t used the Island at peak times yet, but I can only imagine it’s not pretty.

Why would there have been any need to remove the free flow? It doesn't make sense.

[chaseracer]

And for this, the Electric Train Museum had to close.