B3091

Bridge over Key Brook

The B3091 is a rural B-road in northern Dorset.

It starts at a roundabout on the Shaftesbury bypass where it meets the A30 and A350. It heads into town along the pre-bypass route of the A350, quickly meeting the B3081 and multiplexing with it onto the High Street.

Early maps suggest the B3091 left Shaftesbury along the now-pedestrianised Park Walk but its current route is the parallel Bimport. It goes round two side of St James's churchyard before leaving town to cross St James's Common.

After passing Guy's Marsh prison the B3091 descends via Hartgrove to Manston in the valley of the River Stour. It bends sharply right in the centre of the village and then runs parallel to the river as far as Sturminster Newton. Originally the B3091 ran the full length of Station Road (the station closed in the 1960s) but the far end of this is now pedestrianised so the road TOTSOs right at traffic lights onto Old Market Hill (a new relief road), ending at traffic lights on the B3092.

This route used to be almost half a mile longer, continuing through Sturminster across the Stour to the A357 (former A355). However, in 1935 it was decided that as the B3092 carried far more traffic, priority should be given to that route, so the southern end of the road became part of a (very slightly) extended B3092.