B1405

The B1405 is a B-road in Sunderland, forming part of an inner ring road for the city. It is urban dual carriageway for much of its route and links together several of Sunderland's most important radial routes south of the River Wear.

Route

The B1405 as Holborn Road passing through Hylton Lane Estate

The road starts at a junction on the A1231 to the north-west of the city centre. It heads west along Pallion New Road, through a roundabout at the southern end of the Queen Alexandra Bridge, to a junction next to Pallion station - which is accessed via the adjacent retail park. The road runs parallel to the metro line as it continues to the Pallion Industrial Estate, reaching a roundabout where it turns left to begin heading south. It becomes residential as it passes through Ford Estate and meets the C511 Hylton Road - an important class III road linking the city centre with the districts of Pennywell and South Hylton - at a roundabout.

After crossing the A183 at another roundabout the B1405 becomes dual-carriageway, although it remains residential, and limited to 30mph. It passes Barnes Park and then runs through Springwell before crossing the A690 at traffic lights. It continues through the suburbs as Premier Road and Essen Way (the latter named for the city of Essen in Germany, one of Sunderland's twin towns), crossing a few roundabouts before giving up its inside lane to car parking spaces and a cycle lane. A larger roundabout is then met in Leechmere. This isn't a true roundabout as B1405 traffic has priority in both directions; all other traffic, including that on the circle, has to give way. The dual carriageway bears off left here and the B1405 becomes S2 again, but with an increase in speed limit from 30mph to NSL. There's a short run past an industrial estate, with the road briefly dual again past the entrance, before we meet a roundabout serving a retail park, followed by a traffic-light controlled crossroads with the B1522. Curiously, the B1405 is signed in brackets at all approaches to this junction. Shortly after this comes the end of the B1405, at the Salterfen Roundabout on the A1018.

History

The B1405 number did not exist on classification in 1922 but the road came into existence in the late 1920s. The route at that time was similar but ran closer to the centre of town.

The road started at the southern end of the Queen Alexandra Bridge, on what was then the B1290, and headed west along Pallion New Road. However, it soon turned off its present route. It ran south through Pallion along Pallion Road and Kayll Road, then crossed the A183 into Ormonde Street, continuing along Barnes Park Road. On the far side of the A690 it became Queen Alexandra Road, following it to the terminus on the A19 (present B1522) in Grangetown.

The original route of the B1405 lasted until at least the 1990s but the road has now been moved out onto its present, partly new-build route, giving it more the air of a bypass. The old route was renumbered C512. As of 2021, a number of B1405 signs still appear on the old route, particularly along Barnes Park Road and Queen Alexandra Road.

A very short length of the B1405 at its southern end was opened in 2007 to connect to the Southern Radial Route, which became the A1018. Prior to this it ended on the then-A1018 at a roundabout, which was converted into a traffic light controlled crossroads around the same time.

The original north end of the B1405 was truncated slightly when the A1231 Northern Spire bridge opened in 2018, with the A1231 being diverted along the B1405 up to the Queen Alexandra Bridge. This was only ever intended as a temporary layout, and when a newer section of A1231 was built to connect to the Northern Spire, the B1405 regained its former route along with an additional short section of the former A1231.

An amended OpenStreetMap trace for this route awaits uploading to the SABRE Wiki.