The A6195 route was constructed in stages, almost entirely new-build, throughout the late 1990s and 2000s, in order to provide a link road across the former coalfields to the south and east of Barnsley. It starts just north of the A61 - M1 Interchange (J36) at Tankersley, then loops round Barnsley, meeting the A628 Shafton Two Gates Bypass at a roundabout to the north east of Barnsley.
The southern section from the A61 as far as the junction with the A633 south of Wombwell is D2 (although the junctions are all roundabouts), it then multiplexes with the A633 as far as the next roundabout, with the A6195 number dominant. From here it continues as S2, with a number of roundabouts (many to allow for future developments), and carries on northwards and westwards, meeting the A628 at a roundabout on the Shafton Two Gates bypass.