Bath MP Ben Howlett is setting out to discover how much support there is amongst his constituents for an A36/46 link road to be built.
It will be in the form of a parliamentary petition of all Bath residents which will be hand delivered across the city during the summer months. It is a petition to the House of Commons which can be filled out and returned free of charge.
Ben said of the initiative: ‘As you may be aware, one of my election pledges to Bath was to stop our city stalling, by finding solutions to our transport needs. Bath is a World Heritage City – people like us live here, work here and want to visit here – we have to improve our road network to reduce congestion and improve air quality.
‘One solution to our transport needs is to build a link road between the A36 and A46. This project is long overdue and would reduce through traffic and HGVs from entering out beautiful city.
‘The process to secure investment for such a large infrastructure project is long, but I have already raised the matter with David Cameron at Prime Minister’s Question Time, had conversations with Highways England, B&NES Council and neighbouring MPs to get the ball rolling.
I also wrote to the Chancellor about securing investment for the project and received a positive response. All the details of the campaign and letters from the Prime Minister and Chancellor are available on my website http://www.ben4bath.co.uk/a3646-link-road-0
‘So look out for the petition over the summer – delivering to every home in Bath is a big job and if you would like to be part of the delivery team that are working to bring long-term improvements to Bath please contact my office. You can also download a copy of the petition from the website: http://www.ben4bath.co.uk/a3646-link-road-0 – we need your signatures – so please get involved in this opportunity to effect real change in Bath.’
1. Many of those lorries going over the bridge are serving businesses and shops in the City: which way will they go if the Cleveland Bridge is closed to lorries?
2. What route will lorries take to Radstock, Midsomer Norton and Keysham?
3. Have a look at the congestion maps on Google: the worst is in the morning and evening rush hours; mainly private cars, not lorries. How about investing in trafficc reduction not traffic encouragement
4. And please don’t forget that Bath is an important world heritage site, and its environmental quality and economy depends upon it. Lets have some more imaginative thinking than just building roads for more traffic.