Glastonbury's 'Road Consultation'

25/1/2018

Map of Somerset from the Major Road Network consultation documents. Note the A361/A39 between Frome and the M5.

The Department for Transport’s consultation process, with regard to their proposal for a new Major Road Network (MRN), began on December 23rd 2017 (click here to see details). Very few people in Glastonbury know about that, even though its outcome may have a very important effect on their lives and their town. The MRN will be a new ‘tier’ of roads, in between motorways and local roads, to be created by upgrading key A-roads. The A361 through Glastonbury is on their ‘indicative’ map as a potential for upgrading, and this could include a bypass being built around Glastonbury.

The Town Council is organising its own town consultation on the subject, encouraged by our MP James Heappey. Their consultation is due to be delivered to homes on February 14th (it’s their valentine card to all of us!) Everyone wants a bypass, or at least some way of redirecting through traffic away from Chilkwell Street and Bere Lane. The consultation document, however, does not explain that the possible bypass would be part of this new national network – and would therefore increase the overall volume of traffic coming through the Glastonbury area; or that it would be paid for partly by ‘partnership’ funding from property developers – in other words the road could only be built with substantial housing and commercial development along the route.

The combination of these two things would have an enormous impact on Glastonbury’s iconic landscape. The preferred (and most likely) route would be along the old railway track behind the Tor, from Steanbow to the Tin Bridge roundabout.

The Town Council’s ‘Road Consultation’ is being pushed through with inordinate haste. As a result it has been hurriedly prepared, with inadequate background information and badly thought-through questions – creating a bias towards the result that some particular councillors have been wanting for years. There was an attempt to include the half-baked consultation document, printed on Town Council headed notepaper, in with the recent Neighbourhood Plan questionnaire; this turned out to be unlawful, since it amounted to the Council putting undue pressure on the Neighbourhood Plan’s own consultation, and it had to be embarrassingly withdrawn.

At the following Town Council meeting on January 9th, after a heated discussion, the wording was amended, though insufficiently, and the date of February 14th was set for its distribution. The Town Clerk then sent an email out to Councillors asking them to check the revisions. She also made a last-minute addition to the agenda of the Planning Committee’s meeting on January 23rd, where the matter should have been finalised. However, the wrong version of the document was inadvertently sent out with the email; although a second email followed with the correct attachment, the result was complete confusion at the Planning meeting.

Glastonbury Tor photographed from the railway line in the early 1960s.

The reason for the enormous rush is that the consultation has to be completed by March 14th, so that the responses can be collated and the results delivered to the Transport Department by March 19th. They will then be fed into the national MRN consultation. Once this is done the matter will be more-or-less out of Glastonbury’s hands, however much Town Councillors are claiming that this is just a 'preliminary consultation' and that 'we can consult further when we have fuller information'. If the result of the town’s Road Consultation is in favour of a bypass, then Somerset County Council would apply for funding from the National Roads Fund for designing and building the road, and if that is successful then Mendip District Council would have some say on housing and development issues, but decisions would essentially be made in London.

The confusion at the Planning meeting and continued acrimonious discussion over the Road Consultation’s wording meant that the Mayor was left to organise an Extraordinary Meeting of the Town Council so as to sort the situation out – but this never happened because the Planning meeting didn't know that the consultation document had to be with the printers by the following Friday afternoon, January 26th. So it is not possible that better information and better wording can be included, and the consultation will be sent out without further amendment on February 14th.

However, even if the Road Consultation produces its 'preliminary' result in favour of a bypass, the proposed road scheme would still have many hurdles to jump before it could actually happen. The MRN and the availability of extra funds for improving A-roads were only announced last July, and every town in the country that wants a bypass will be looking for money from the same pot. But James Heappey is an ambitious young MP, he has a certain amount of influence in that he is Parliamentary Private Secretary to Chris Grayling the Secretary of State for Transport, and he has been a strong supporter of the railway track route for a Glastonbury bypass since before he was elected. To some extent he has staked his political reputation on it.

Since his intervention (last August) Glastonbury’s A361 Committee has given up looking for an acceptable alternative route for freight traffic, the Neighbourhood Plan steering group has been fending off pressure from influential Town Councillors, and due process in public consultation has been threatened or undermined. If Glastonbury Town Councillors do nothing except follow unquestioningly Mr Heappey’s lead, then they will have failed to stand up for the town and instead they will have sold it very cheaply down the river.

For a discussion of the 'Southern Route' see here:
what-is-the-southern-route-shown-on-the-road-consultation-map.html

If you feel this is important, please pass the link on:
www.unique-publications/newsblog/glastonburys-road-consultation

Facebook contacts: loveourlevels, normalforglastonbury

23 Comments

Julie O’Maley

1/2/2018 02:18:11 pm

I object most strongly to this shortsighted plan that will alter and scar a sacred and worldwide famous land mark , Glastonbury Tour. The views from the tour will be mired by a foul looking road instead of green fields. Appalling

Paul Manning link

22/2/2018 02:40:35 pm

The two proposed routes are actually both further away from the Tor than the existing road!

You are right though that the Tor is an iconic landmark as well as a sacred site. Therefore the view from it should not be despoiled.

Be aware that the medieval streets of Glastonbury are going to get an additional 750 polluting lorries thundering through each day from September and that is excluding the growth of traffic generally. We need to make the town a more pleasant place for our visitors

Bruce Garrard

25/2/2018 08:20:19 am

The 'northern route' would do more than spoil the view from the Tor. Together with substantial development, it would cut off the Tor and Chalice Hill from open countryside and ultimately turn them into isolated green spaces within the town, rather than on its periphery.

The number of quarry lorries heading for Hinkley Point is to be increased from 500 to a maximum of 750 per day. This side of the M5 they are spread over several different routes (I live on Chilkwell Street, and I helped with the recent traffic census; there were just over 100 quarry lorries going in each direction). This shows that other viable routes are available.

Andria King

8/2/2018 08:29:14 am

I would like to see a detailed map of exactly where the G'bury by-pass might run, and alternative routes too. And it's one thing to object but I feel locals also need to suggest less damaging routes... Instead of just objecting, we need to be inventive - might cut through the confusion and influence the councillors. I suspect most people can't 'see' the old railway line from Steanbow to Tinbridge. I'm having trouble imaging it.

Bruce Garrard

8/2/2018 11:27:10 am

Yes of course, and all that is happening. The whole story can't go into one blog post. This is specifically about the Town Council's consultation process, which many feel is badly flawed.

Andria King link

9/2/2018 01:27:27 am

That's good. As for the TC, I can't usefully comment; the process is too convoluted for me. Thinking ahead though, I can see a large group actually walking the proposed route ... as we did with the Bovetown Trees campaign years ago; we used actual experience and emotional response to secure victory. It can never be an 'on paper' objection, it has to be felt.

Bruce Garrard

9/2/2018 01:36:12 am

Thanks for the suggestion re Bovetown. There's been a couple of small walks along the route already.
And if only it was just the Town Council! If this goes ahead it will involve Town, District and County Councils, a regional bureaucracy to be set up (to prioritise bids from the southwest), and the Department for Transport!

ewan hayes link

10/2/2018 02:21:09 am

the idea of a by pass is basically essential but would not a policy of using rail not be better. cars are becoming less attractive and the damage to property is growing from trucks hurtling through bere lane street road and chilkwell street which must be frightening for residents and depressing the property market. then once the road that Heappey suggests is bulit it spills onto existing roads willy nilly,Accordingly the planners and councils need to provide a workable practicable solution. Not a potential way of dumping a proven problem into a different place,

Bruce Garrard

10/2/2018 02:37:12 am

Using rail is an interesting idea, though the railway line route in one direction goes through the middle of the Glastonbury Festival site, and in the other through a flooded area that is now an important wildlife reserve.
Meanwhile, the government wants to encourage the car industry.

Paul Manning

22/2/2018 02:47:55 pm

Completely agree, Ewan. The town is currently one of the most isolated from the rail network in the south of England. Several of the lorries going through the town are supplying Hinkley and their loads should be going by rail or sea - except the facilities are not ready yet! Somerset CC recently agreed to us taking the extra lorries through the town without a penny of compensation. It would have been better that rather than face this disruption, a rail line had been built which would have left the town with a legacy

Bruce Garrard

25/2/2018 02:10:40 pm

A rail line would have been an interesting option, though this depended olin a commercial decision made by EDF. They rejected it at an early stage, as reported at a Town Council meeting four or five years ago.

Paula BROOKES link

15/2/2018 12:10:07 am

Let us protect our environment as best we can!

Tony Thomson link

16/2/2018 12:08:09 pm

the extra proposed 2,200 houses would generate an uplift of land value (@100K per dwelling) of £220 million. 5 miles of bypass at £5m per mile = £25 million....all these commuters will need a new road........
AECOM already done one housing assesment for GTC..they are a multinational infrastructure outfit,

Adrian Dalziel

17/2/2018 08:57:18 am

I have said for over 20 years that the logical route for the extension to the Bypass should be along the old railway line to Tin Bridge from Steanbow. However the original should have been routed behind Beckery to the Pipers thus bypassing everything - too late now!
Finally it's interesting to note the change in the Tors name ( ie Tour )!!

Steve Parkes

19/2/2018 04:59:16 am

I've only lived in Glastonbury for the last five years though, before that, I had been a fairly frequent visitor to the area since 1994 and have become very fond of this place.
Glastonbury has expanded a lot over the years – as have most towns throughout the country. When I look at old maps that show the railway routes that used to run through here, I always feel what a marvellous idea it was to build the Relief Road along its old route, skirting the town along its North-Western edge and taking all the through traffic away from Wells Road by re-routing the A39 that way.
I can see that the A361 is a serious problem as things stand, with its traffic having to run along Bere Lane and Chilcott Street, so a new bypass IS really needed.
I obviously haven’t seen any official maps that would show the actual route that’s favourite, though I gather we would be talking following the old railway further on from Tinbridge roundabout to Steanbow? This seems to me to be an excellent idea! What is the problem with it?
You are saying that there would be lots of housing and commercial development along that route? If that is so, why hasn’t that happened along the existing Relief Road? I can probably answer that, though, by looking at the map of land that’s threatened by flooding. The Relief Road’s former railway embankment forms a margin along the very edge of the flood plain there, making building development difficult if not impossible on the north-west side.
That gives rise to the question: How was the Relief Road funded in the ‘90s without the possibility of building developments along its route? Will this new bypass be different?
As for the objection based on the “spoiling of the view from the Tor”, that just seems to me to be nitpicking. How was the view from the Tor years ago, when the railway line was carrying trains along its route, belching out smoke and noise? I, personally, would have no objection to being able to see a busy main road from up there, even with new buildings along its length. It would not block the overall view of the wider landscape.
Having said all this – I am not necessarily in support of any developers here, either. I’m just playing Devil’s Advocate a bit, I suppose. I have no vested interest in any of it – I’m a retired graphic artist.
The bottom line is – we do need a bypass for the A361 and this proposal would seem to offer a very good way of linking that road to the A39 while keeping a lot more through traffic away from the town here. I do NOT see why it should generate an overall increase in haulage traffic along those roads? The lorries are using the existing routes anyway. This just gives them a better route away from our town.

Bruce Garrard

19/2/2018 05:58:09 am

What's different about this road proposal is that it would be part of the government's new proposal for a 'Major Road Network' (MRN). New roads always attract extra traffic, but this would do so even more because its main purpose would be to get traffic from the other side of Frome over to the M5.

Also the MRN, as a matter of policy, would be funded partly (30%) by 'partnership funding' from developers. This would mean development quite out of proportion to the town as it already is, and (as you say) right on the edge of the flood plain. The relief road built in the '90s was funded in the old-fashioned way – paid for by the County Council. Over the years rate-capping, government cuts and disproportionate rises in the cost of road building have meant that County Councils can now not afford to decide to build roads and then just do it.

I think 'spoiling the view from the Tor' is understating it somewhat. It would cut the Tor and Chalice Hill off from open countryside, doing untold damage to what many of us consider to be a sacred landscape. Perhaps more needs to be said about that aspect.

Finally, we do need a different route for traffic coming along the A361/A39 through Glastonbury, though that does not have to mean a new bypass. The reason this has come up now is because Glastonbury – in spite of many objections over the years – is on a designated Freight Haulage route, and this in turn means we are currently in danger of being on the Major Road Network route. Given the heritage aspect and the fact that we are basically an island in the middle of a wetland, this (to my mind at least) is entirely inappropriate.

Steve Parkes

19/2/2018 04:11:07 pm

Thanks for explaining that to me, Bruce. I quite see your point. So this plan, then, would actually put Glastonbury slap-bang on a new, inter-motorway haulage major route, which it isn't at the moment? I’m a bit puzzled by that.
When I look at my road atlas, the proposed, red-coloured road shown in the map at the top of this page is already existing – as the A361 from Frome as far as Glastonbury, then continues along the A39, through Street and on to J23 of the M5.
There must already be lorries that regularly need to get to that part of the M5 from Frome, so what route must they taking now, that they would be attracted away from, to use this new road?
I can’t see any better existing route for them to be taking than to come through Glastonbury as it is now anyway, so why not build a new bypass, away from the town, to accommodate them better?
Their using a bypass would, surely, be better than them having to come thundering along past the Chalice Well as they must be doing now? Where is Glastonbury’s ‘island’ status now, with the roads as they already are?
If the proposed ‘Northern’ route is too offensive in that it crosses a sacred area (did the old railway route not cross that same, sacred area?), then what is being suggested as an alternative? Looking at my maps, I can see no logical answers, other than building miles and miles of entirely new road across open country to bypass Wells instead of here and cut through Godney and Meare – something I’m sure those local residents would have their own, vigorous objections to and I can’t say I’d blame them!
I can see no logical alternative to a northern bypass.
I would be keenly interested to hear what alternatives are being suggested.
By the way – I’ve had no questionnaire delivered to me yet from the Town Council. What happened to 14th Feb., I wonder?

Paul Manning

22/2/2018 03:31:43 pm

Our town attracts over 700k visitors per annum, they are not well served by having a designated Freight Haulage Route going through the town centre.

In terms of the routes, I can see very little difference between the Freight Haulage routes

http://www.freightjourneyplanner.co.uk/

and the Major Road Networks

http://maps.dft.gov.uk/major-road-network-consultation/

There is also a Strategic Road Network - which are effectively one step down from a motorway (basically fast dual carriageways) which Glastonbury is not part of and a long way from.

If there was an alternative freight route it would have been implemented years ago. At the moment the A361 is closed at Walton, so HGV traffic is being sent on a detour across the levels (including parts that were several feet underwater a few years ago). I am really intrigued as to what the alternative route is, as any route would appear to me to cause considerably more environmental damage than the ones mentioned in your blog.

There is of course the other option which is to do nothing. It would be a disaster for the town if the existing A361 became part of the major road network. Even without any development in Glastonbury the continued traffic growth will not bypass us and we shall have misery for residents and tourists.

Bruce Garrard

20/2/2018 12:58:53 am

At the moment it's a designated County Freight Route, and if this scheme goes ahead it will be 'improved' (i.e. bypasses etc built) so that it would be fit for use as part of the Major Road Network.

I have added a link at the bottom of this post to a more recent one, dealing with the 'Southern Route' option which will appear on the Town Council's Consultation when it eventually arrives. At the bottom of that are several links to other short articles, one of which looks at other possible routes.

There is one poor chap who is trying to deliver all the questionnaires on his own. He reckons the job will take another fortnight, by which time the questionnaires will already be due for processing to meet the March 19th deadline. It is quite possible that this Road Consultation will fall apart due to Town Council ineptitude.

Bruce Garrard

25/2/2018 08:27:21 am

In reply to Paul Manning's comment above:

'Indicative' routes for the Major Road Network are based on the freight haulage routes, so there is no difference. This is the danger: it was inappropriate for Glastonbury to be on a designated freight route in the first place, and now this has resulted in us being on the route of something with even greater implications.

My thoughts on alternative routes are here:
www.unique-publications.co.uk/alternative-routes
Moving the designated freight route would take away with it the potential for Glastonbury to be on the Major Road Network.

Emily Burtenshaw

26/2/2018 09:27:59 am

I think the issue of noise from the proposed road along the old railway line should also be considered...if you walk up Wearyall hill the noise coming from traffic in the road below is pronounced. The same would happen when up the Tor in this scenario. At the moment the Tor sits in an island of quiet...part of its special appeal and attraction when you are up there looking out on the countryside. Not sure what the solution to the current traffic is though I think the Southern route might be preferable in this regard.

Steve Parkes

26/2/2018 10:11:43 am

I'm afraid I have to disagree with you there, Emily. Look how much closer to both Wearyall Hill AND the Tor the Southern Proposed road is on the map! If we had all the predicted extra traffic using the 'B' proposal road, that is practically on TOP of both landmark hills and would be a far worse option, noise-wise, than the much more remotely-placed railway route to the North.
Also, I doubt whether the 'B' proposal is a serious contender anyway - I think the council have just thrown it in to look as though they are giving us a democratic choice, when in reality it would never meet approval, nor be of any practical use at all!

Chilkwell

2/5/2018 04:17:26 am

I wonder why many of the houses down Chilkwell Street (the Riflemans and Chalice Well end) have suddenly sold in the month of April? Some of these houses have been on the market for a very long time suddenly got snapped up.

Glastonbury's 'Road Consultation'

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