B3068
| B3068 | |||||||||||||
| Location Map ( geo) | |||||||||||||
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| From: | Upton Bypass (SY977936) | ||||||||||||
| To: | Alderney (SZ045945) | ||||||||||||
| Via: | Hamworthy, Poole, Foxholes | ||||||||||||
| Distance: | 5.5 miles (8.9 km) | ||||||||||||
| Meets: | A35, A350, B3067, B3061, A3049 | ||||||||||||
| Former Number(s): | A350, A348 | ||||||||||||
| Old route now: | A350 | ||||||||||||
| Primary Destinations | |||||||||||||
| Highway Authorities | |||||||||||||
| Traditional Counties | |||||||||||||
| Route outline (key) | |||||||||||||
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Route
The B3068 runs through the town of Poole but it is quicker to travel between its two ends by using other routes!
Starting at the grade-separated junction of the A350 with the A35 Upton bypass north-west of Poole, the B3068 proceeds in a south-easterly direction through Upton to Hamworthy as a single-carriageway road with a 30 mph limit – which it is tempting to exceed, as this 2.5-mile stretch is near straight throughout.
In Hamworthy the road meets the looped southern end of the A350 – which crosses the channel linking Holes Bay to Poole Harbour by means of the Twin Sails Bridge (2012) and the older Poole Bridge (1927) – and comes to an interim end.
On the eastern side of the crossings a quarter-mile section of West Quay Road (between the Marston Road turn and Hunger Hill) forms a brief, isolated section of the B3068. Anyone wishing to continue on to reach the eastern part of the B3068 should avoid following this section, however, since in this direction it debouches at Hunger Hill only onto the northbound A350 (Holes Bay Road), from which there is no easy return!
The B3068 proper resumes where it leaves the A350 High Street North about a furlong north-east of The George Roundabout. We pass Poole General Hospital on the right and then the Shah of Persia public house on our left at a traffic-light controlled intersection of the A350: yet another encounter with that road! After bearing left at a little roundabout at the bottom of Constitution Hill we climb up to Newtown and continue along Ringwood Road. A pair of mini-roundabouts marks the staggered-crossroads junction with Mannings Heath Road and Herbert Avenue, after which it is only a short distance (with a bus lane southbound) to the end of our route at the Alderney Roundabout on the A3049.
History
The original 1922 version of the B3068 was the short section between Poole Bridge and what is now the George Roundabout. This seems to have become the A350 in the 1960s but later still the B3068 reappeared, having extended this road in both directions.
Upton to Poole was originally the A350, while Poole to Alderney was originally the A348 and was downgraded to Class II status in the 1980s with the building of the A3049 Dorset Way.
