M54 Extension and M6 Toll/M42 Jct Improvements announced

[danfw194]

It flipping well should be given it would cost hundreds of times as much! A more like-for-like comparison would be the benefits of the motorway upgrade vs the benefits of commissioning some reports about the dualling (but no actual road).

It's a fair point. I just personally don't see any benefit whatsoever of the upgrade, even if it came in relatively 'cheap' because it's mainly just changing sign colours. I'll take the reports every time in this case!

[Chris Bertram]

* Shrewsbury actually isn't particularly large or important - it only looks so on a map because everywhere else in Shropshire (other than Telford) is tiny. It is on the Major Towns and Cities dataset - but only just, and then only due to its workday population, not due to its resident population.

I think that's a little unfair to Shrewsbury. It is, after all, the local county town and a centre of gravity in the way that is implied by that. But more importantly, from a roads point of view, it's a major point of navigation, being where the A5 (Telford's Holyhead Road at this point), A49 and A458 intersect, plus A53, A488 and A528 arrive from various angles. As a result it has warranted not just one, but two by-passes in its recent history, which should tell us something, and not just how unsuited the town centre is to modern through traffic (though that is indisputable). Compared to that, Telford is a mere crossroads

[WHBM]

I'd rather investment went towards providing a continuous dual carriageway to Ruabon rather than changing the colour of some signs on an already high quality section of A5.

Improving journey time on this section would lead to quite a significant diversion of traffic from the M6 should there be a continuous HQDC from Wolverhampton to Chester, traffic for North Wales and Merseyside. It's currently not quite good enough for that. Doing two second Dee and then Ceiriog Viaducts at Chirk would be a substantial cost. You have to wonder how those sorts of structures were somehow affordable not too long ago (and indeed once upon a time for both the parallel railway and canal viaducts as well), but nowadays the pricing has become stratospheric.

Birmingham to Chester I found by experimentation that M54-A41 is currently better than A5-A483. M6 could be quicker or slower dependent on conditions.

[Berk]

The M54 - M6 link application was received by the Planning Inspectorate at the end of January. It should make a decision on whether to accept the application by the end of the week.

So, should be starting examination very soon.

[Truvelo]

I still believe the scheme upgrades the wrong junction. M54 J1 never queues apart from being on the tail end of the queue on the A460 caused by the lights at Featherstone. It's really J11 that needs the freeflow. And because the existing A460 from Featherstone will still tie in to J11 it means there can be no freeflow left turn from the new road to the M6 north.

[Berk]

Granted, but have you seen the state of the A460 at present, with its 10mph crawl??

The presence of speed cameras is as pointless as it is offensive - they can’t catch anyone during the day!!

It’s not a perfect scheme by a long way, but it will make things a lot better than they are now.

[jackal]

The latest general arrangement drawing, with lane allocations etc:

https://infrastructure.planninginspecto ... 0Plans.pdf

[jackal]

A couple of the rejected alternatives for J1 were quite interesting:

The second one is a bit weird. There were also options for a hamburger or elongated roundabout (both rightly rejected).

Here's what the full freeflow option at J11 and M6T J8 would have looked like:

Once the decision was made to remove the link to the M6T it seems that no freeflow options were considered for J11.

https://infrastructure.planninginspecto ... er%203.pdf

[Steven]

I still believe the scheme upgrades the wrong junction. M54 J1 never queues apart from being on the tail end of the queue on the A460 caused by the lights at Featherstone. It's really J11 that needs the freeflow. And because the existing A460 from Featherstone will still tie in to J11 it means there can be no freeflow left turn from the new road to the M6 north.

The tailbacks onto the mainline of the M54 for the eastbound exit would disagree with you.

They are to be fair, mostly caused by the lights at Featherstone, but to dismiss it as "never queues" is very, very wrong; especially as there is sufficient traffic northbound A460 -> A460 at that junction to cause problems with accessing the circulatory carriageway from M54 if the traffic light queue disappeared. Of course, the alternative option would be to signalise the roundabout at this point...

[Truvelo]

A better J11 design would have been this which allows traffic from M6 south to A460 north to avoid one set of lights and permits a future left turn filter lane from the new road to M6 north. The report mentions this design would also reduce ratrunning through Featherstone by severing the existing A460. But really, the last option in Jackal's last post minus the M6T links would have been the perfect solution.

Time will tell if this becomes another M40 J10.

[jusme]

Now they're planning to make it a cycle path instead (joking...)

https://www.expressandstar.com/news/tra ... road-plan/

[JF2309]

Indeed - and people forget the reason the M54 was built was Telford not Shrewsbury.

I'd rather investment went towards providing a continuous dual carriageway to Ruabon rather than changing the colour of some signs on an already high quality section of A5.

Absolutely this, and either am better access from the M6 to the North from J15 (Although that has its own problems right now) or properly sorting out M6 J11 or 10A to facilitate it. Slapping Blue signs on the A5 doesn’t solve the A5’s problems. Motorways are not a magic economical bullet by themselves.

[jackal]

"The Examining Authority issued a Recommendation Report to the Secretary of State on 21 July 2021. The Secretary of State has three months in which to issue a decision. The decision letter and Recommendation Report will be published on this project page once a decision has been made."

https://infrastructure.planninginspecto ... link-road/

A slightly revised general arrangement was published in March:

https://infrastructure.planninginspecto ... 0Plans.pdf

[Bryn666]

J11 is an absolute bin fire, I see. Just doing the same as J10, bigger roundabout with wider, not shorter, queues. FFS.

[jackal]

Surely when you're designing a junction between a motorway and expressway, and the minimum width of your roundabout is four lanes, you have to at least consider freeflow. There's no evidence it was even looked at once the M6T connection was dropped.

[Bryn666]

Surely when you're designing a junction between a motorway and expressway, and the minimum width of your roundabout is four lanes, you have to at least consider freeflow. There's no evidence it was even looked at once the M6T connection was dropped.

You'd think - there's no way that roundabout can operate at a safe level, especially not with near 90 degree turns and so many potential conflict points.

They just can't design junctions. It's obvious.

[Steven]

https://infrastructure.planninginspecto ... 0Plans.pdf

Does the fact that the red line surrounds A460 between M6 and M6 Toll (and short stretches of A460 and A4601 the other side of the T8 roundabout) mean that that section will be trunked? It's currently not.

[Bryn666]

https://infrastructure.planninginspecto ... 0Plans.pdf

Does the fact that the red line surrounds A460 between M6 and M6 Toll (and short stretches of A460 and A4601 the other side of the T8 roundabout) mean that that section will be trunked? It's currently not.

Not necessarily, it just shows the extents of the DCO I think. It should be trunked though given it has a strategic function.

[Steven]

And I see they've also finally decided to make the link an all-purpose road. That's not ideal to say the least. By leaving the A460 connected in place as per the diagrams there could have been excellent provision for NMUs along the old road, and making the link a Special Road would have protected from development.

With its location I give it five years before the first ten sheds appear along it.

[RichardA35]

Proposed Trunk Roads listed in Schedule 3 part 2 of the draft DCO with limits cross referenced back to the plans
https://infrastructure.planninginspecto ... 0Order.pdf