A619

Route

The A619 is a medium-length A-road connecting industrial towns of the East Midlands with the Peak District.

Section 1: Worksop – Chesterfield

The road begins, as it always has, at a junction with the A60 south of Worksop. The junction is now rather bizarre - think of a roundabout in reverse - where traffic on the roundabout gives way to traffic approaching it. We head west and pass underneath a steel railway bridge and then over farmland past Whitwell to reach an at-grade crossroads with the A618. This section has a 50mph speed limit and speed cameras to enforce it. Several wide bends take us into Barlborough, and before entering the village an old alignment of the road can be seen on the right.

A small roundabout is the old junction with the A616 - the existing one with that road's new alignment is 200 yards further on. The speed limit here has been recently reduced to 40mph. The bridge over the M1 just afterwards is interesting as it is unused D2 - what would be the westbound side is a lay-by whilst the eastbound side is used for the road itself; road markings even suggest that this road was D2 at one time.

Mastin Moor

We then pass through a very slow section of the route. It is only six miles long, but the villages of Mastin Moor, Staveley and Brimington are all adjacent to each other and get quite congested. There is a short one-way system in Brimington too. Add in 30 and 40mph speed limits enforced by a forest of speed cameras, and traffic heading for Chesterfield from the M1 South would probably be quicker to avoid this route, despite it being the signed one, and use junction 29 and the D2 A617 instead.

The route then multiplexes with the A61 south before diverging to the right at the next roundabout. In between, there is a limited GSJ with the A632.

Section 2: Chesterfield – Bakewell

After leaving the A61 in Chesterfield, the route of the A619 follows what is actually a useless multiplex with the A617 to the next roundabout where it meets the A632 only 50 yards from the GSJ mentioned above (eastbound traffic is in fact directed via the GSJ rather than the A61 roundabout). These two routes then multiplex for a couple of miles before the latter turns off at a small roundabout adjacent to a supermarket.

The outskirts of the town become leafier as the speed limit increases to 40mph, before we ascend a long hill that has now been straightened and given two lanes on the uphill side. The original alignment can still be seen on the right, and it is also used for a couple of lay-bys. The top section of the hill at Wadshelf is still S2 however. We pass the Highwayman pub before gradually descending a long, sometimes twisty, hill, though the top half has been straightened.

The A621 and A623 are both met at roundabouts in the village of Baslow and the River Derwent is crossed on a relatively new bridge. There is then a TOTSO right at the B6012 (old A623) junction. Several sweeping bends take us to an acute-angled crossroad junction with the B6048 and A6020. This latter route takes over the primary designation - being the through route to the A6 north - whilst the A619 is downgraded to non-primary on its final couple of miles into Bakewell.

Crossing the River Wye

We cross the river Wye on a magnificent 14th-century stone-arched bridge, and then negotiate a very short one-way system in Bakewell town centre, before reaching the end of the A619 at a roundabout junction with the A6.

History

The A619 has swapped numbers with the B6043 at Whitwell. Whereas now the A619 is the bypass and the B6043 goes through the village, originally it was the other way round.

Near Chesterfield, the old route now has B-road status and drops south towards the historic crooked spire and its former junctions with the A61 and A632.

The section between Chesterfield and M1 has been the subject of various bypass proposals over the years. The earliest was in 1935 for two short single carriageway bypasses of Brimington and Staveley. By the 1950s the proposal was for a dual carriageway. In 1964 a route following the abandoned railway running to the north of Brimington was investigated but by 1970 this route had lost favour compared to a shorter route running to the south of Brimington. This route then become the county council's preferred route but it was not favoured by all as it divided Tapton and cut a swathe through Ringwood Park. In 1971 a route based on the former railway route was investigated and became known as the valley route. This had some disadvantages including being slightly longer than the preferred route and the junction at Brimington was placed in a less than convenient location meaning a significant amount of traffic would remain on the existing road. The scheme remained in the planning process for another few years without what appears to be any final decision as to what, if any, route had finally been decided upon before being withdrawn in 1977.

1971 preferred route

1971 alternative valley route

The scheme was revived in the 1980s in a much scaled down form as a single carriageway with roundabouts. The 1988 proposal followed a line very close to the valley route which was rejected by the county council the previous decade. In 1989 a small part of this scheme, the Tapton Bypass, was built. Since then proposals to complete the bypass have resurfaced regularly but nearly 90 years after first mooted the road is no closer to being built.

Opening Dates

Year	Section	Notes
1925	Baslow: Devonshire Bridge	The new bridge over the River Derwent (and 385 yards of approach roads) was opened on 14 May 1925 by E.C. Barnes, County Council Chairman. There were two main arches of 36 feet, two flood arches of 16 feet and two land arches of 10 feet, a total length of 178 feet. Width between parapets was 40 feet, with a 28 foot carriageway and two 6 foot footpaths. It was constructed in concrete with ashlar facings. Contractor was Lehane, Mackenzie and Shand Ltd. of Darley Dale, cost £30,000. It may have opened as an unclassified road before the re-routing of A619. There was also a period as a multiplex with A623.
1989	Tapton Bypass	The 0.5 mile link from Brimington Roundabout (A61) on the Chesterfield Inner Relief Road to Brimington Road (B6543) was opened on 10 April 1989 by Joe Murphy, County Councillor. Contractor was A.F. Budge of Retford, cost £3.47 million. It was the first of the three planned bypasses on the A619 Brimington – Staveley Corridor but the others were later shelved.