A130/A131 Chelmsford North East Bypass

[SouthWest Philip]

Anyone who has ever used the existing A130/A131 route around the NE of Chelmsford will know that it has basically descended into a housing development spine with lots of roundabouts to provide access to future estates and its effectiveness as a strategic route has been somewhat compromised. It seems, however, that Essex CC have long-term plans to replace the existing route with a new (almost) free-flowing bypass...

Chelmsford North Eastern Bypass Document

Not sure what the current status of this project is; the consultation document is a few years old now, but I think the plans are still on.

Interesting to note that the proposed interchange at the southern end looks quite substantial and, for northbound traffic, pretty good. It is, however, rather less good for southbound traffic which will still have to pass through a roundabout.

[SteveA30]

A few recent atlases have had dotted lines there, implying something has been planned.

[Sunil_of_Yoxley]

Do the A130 and A131 still "cannon" or does the A131 now make it all the way to the A12?

[si404]

Do the A130 and A131 still "cannon" or does the A131 now make it all the way to the A12?

Did they ever cannon?

You mean meet end-on, don't you.

The B1008 cannons with the A road now, but the A road is numbered A131 to the north and A130 to the south. I've not seen anything to suggest that this has been changed.

[c2R]

Do the A130 and A131 still "cannon" or does the A131 now make it all the way to the A12?

Did they ever cannon?

You mean meet end-on, don't you.

The B1008 cannons with the A road now, but the A road is numbered A131 to the north and A130 to the south. I've not seen anything to suggest that this has been changed.

Last time I drove that way it hadn't been altered. I think that it'll probably all be numbered A131 if and when the bypass opens.

[Sunil_of_Yoxley]

Sorry, yes of course I meant "Meet end on"

[Sam]

Did they ever cannon?

You mean meet end-on, don't you.

The B1008 cannons with the A road now, but the A road is numbered A131 to the north and A130 to the south. I've not seen anything to suggest that this has been changed.

Last time I drove that way it hadn't been altered. I think that it'll probably all be numbered A131 if and when the bypass opens.

The poor A130 faces yet another shortening! It's been gradually chopped back from Cambridge, Trumpington, Great Dunmow... and after these proposals, it may not exist north of Chelmsford at all!

Sam

[Runwell]

Plans were approved late last year. Work on the housing begins very shortly, if not already.

The town had a second park and ride open off the A130 Patching Hall Lane roundabout a couple of years ago.

Road is desperately needed to cure the queues at Boreham which mess up the A12 around Chelmsford. Will also take the pressure off the A130 down to the Sainsburys, and beyond, around the current Beaulieu site.

[jackal]

Essex CC still hope to build the bypass and published a Safeguarded Corridor Update in March: http://www.essexhighways.org/highway-sc ... ypass.aspx

You can still see the preferred option here:
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&sourc ... Oxti-IRn34

In 2008 the cost was listed as £229m-£262m, half of it for a revised, partially freeflow J12. You'd probably be looking at in excess of £400m in 2017 prices.

[roadtester]

It's also shown in my 2018 Collins Essential Road Atlas Britain (the large-scale one with junction detail) as a dashed green line, I think (can't check straight away as it's out in the car).

I hope this gets built - I visit Southend from Cambridgeshire a few times a year and this is by far the worst bit of the journey if I cut across country via the A120/Chelmsford, rather than doing M11 > M25 >A127

[Fluid Dynamics]

This is generally a good plan, the A130/A131 does rather reduce in quality as you approach Chelmsford's suburbs, and the route to the A12 at the bottom end always feels over complicated and bodged together.

As has been mentioned upstream it's a pity with the amount of worked planned that the A130 south to A12 south movement could not be grade separated, but the plan does demonstrate the constraints. I hope they've taken the A12 dialling proposals into account.

[jackal]

The junction is at least arranged so the main flows (A131sb->A12sb and A12sb->Chelmsford) don't conflict at the eastern rbt.

[Fluid Dynamics]

The junction is at least arranged so the main flows (A131sb->A12sb and A12sb->Chelmsford) don't conflict at the eastern rbt.

That's very true, and the HE A120 Braintree to A12 scheme will cater for long distance traffic for/from Braintree minimising the A12 westbound to A130 northbound and A130 southbound to A12 eastbound.

If both schemes are built, along with A12 improvements, Essex is going to have quite a decent strategic network.

[JonB2028]

The junction is at least arranged so the main flows (A131sb->A12sb and A12sb->Chelmsford) don't conflict at the eastern rbt.

That's very true, and the HE A120 Braintree to A12 scheme will cater for long distance traffic for/from Braintree minimising the A12 westbound to A130 northbound and A130 southbound to A12 eastbound.

If both schemes are built, along with A12 improvements, Essex is going to have quite a decent strategic network.

Fingers crossed, especially the A120 bit. ECC are supposed to be announcing something on that this autumn I think following the consultation earlier in the year. The HE also have plans to widen the A12 in this area.

[ChrisH]

These Essex schemes would form a decent set of complementary measures to the Lower Thames Crossing. It would be possible to get from the M2 to M11 via dual carriageway and without touching the M25 or Dartford Crossing.

[jackal]

I like that idea. With a few further upgrades you could make a reasonably direct and fully GSJed M2-M11 outer orbital route:

- 6 miles of grade-separated D2 roughly along the line of the B1008 to cut out the dogleg to Braintree and its roundabouts.
- additional freeflow at M11/A120, A12/A130, A12/A130 again, A127/A130 and A13/A1089/LTC. A127/A130, A13/A1089/LTC and one of the A12/A130 junctions are planned to be rebuilt anyway so it would only be two new junction schemes.
- A12 J17-19 would have to be widened to D4. Widening here is inevitable in any case.

[ChrisH]

I like that idea. With a few further upgrades you could make a reasonably direct and fully GSJed M2-M11 outer orbital route:

- 6 miles of grade-separated D2 roughly along the line of the B1008 to cut out the dogleg to Braintree and its roundabouts.
- additional freeflow at M11/A120, A12/A130, A12/A130 again, A127/A130 and A13/A1089/LTC. A127/A130, A13/A1089/LTC and one of the A12/A130 junctions are planned to be rebuilt anyway so it would only be two new junction schemes.
- A12 J17-19 would have to be widened to D4. Widening here is inevitable in any case.

Google suggests that from the A13 at Stanford-le-Hope (which is where the Lower Thames Crossing will hit) it's 38 miles to Stansted via the A13/M25/M11; and 40 miles to Stansted via the A130 and B1008. Currently it would take 30 minutes longer via Chelmsford but most of that delay is occurring on the section of the A130 that's to be widened, and pootling through the villages which would be bypassed by ECC's scheme north-east of Chelmsford.

It wouldn't take much for this route to be competitive with the M25 once the LTC is operational. I wonder if HE or ECC are planning for that eventuality?

[jackal]

Unfortunately the preferred route for the LTC (route 3) provides a connection to the A13 east that is both a) circuitous and b) at-grade.

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[The God of Biscuits]

This doesn't appear to have been mentioned specifically upthread, but there are a number of smaller-scale improvements scheduled for the A130/A131 which are separate to the large NE bypass plan of the thread title.

In the short term some minor tweaks to some of the roundabouts (filters/two-lane exits/etc.) and bus lanes are planned: http://www.essexhighways.org/highway-sc ... ments.aspx

In the medium term, the Beaulieu housing development's 'Radial Distributor Road' will take over the relevant section of the A130, and provide a better (albeit still single carriageway) route to the Boreham interchange on the A12; replacement of the Generals Lane bridge and some tweaks to the interchange itself are involved: http://planning.chelmsford.gov.uk/Plann ... /00221/REM (you'll need to root around amongst all the documents to find the plan)

The D2 NE bypass plan looks to me like a very long term aspiration, perhaps dependent on its implications for wider southeast connectivity as mentioned previously. That being said, I think the idea of building a GSJ D2 in the B1008 corridor to 'cut the corner' is a non-starter, given Essex CC's previous downgrading of it from A130 - presumably they will want to connect their major population centres together better (hence the Braintree-Chelmsford axis rather than Great Dunmow-Chelmsford)?

[jackal]

I don't see that the previous A130 downgrade is relevant to the B1008 corner cutting idea. You don't want strategic traffic going along a low quality single carriageway (B1008/former A13) that leads onto another low quality single carriageway in an urban area (A130), hence the downgrade. But you would want strategic traffic on a fully grade-separated DC that takes traffic off the M25 and overloaded arterials.