Melksham has a traffic congestion around its outskirts. In particular, this is on the road used by traffic headed between north and south, with pinch points in the Melksham North ward. The congestion leads to delays ... effect on the economy, effect on air quality, safety issues, unpleasant to live nearby, separates the town from the northwestern area and the railway station.

There are other issues too. Traffic through Beanacre, through the town centre headed towards Calne, and the road out through Woodrow.

Where are things changing? What's needed for the future?

1. With the closure (for how long?) of the Cleveland Bridge in Bath, much of the heavy traffic that's gone across / through there is the past is spilling into Wiltshire, and passing past Melksham on the A350.

2. The introduction of the Clean Air Zone in Bath also encourages heavy traffic into Wiltshire - £100 extra cost going through Bath is more than the extra cost of driving through Wiltshire

3. Towns to the south are growing, adding more vehicles passing Melksham on their way to the motorway

4. Melksham is growing too - and the natural way out for many of the homes and businesses coming is also via the A350 up towards the M4

5. Coronavirus has encouraged people to use private transport (cars) in preference to public transport - as I write, car traffic looks pretty much back up to where it was before the first lockdown, but public transport use is well down.

All of those suggest increase traffic ... but on the other hand

A. If people are working from home more, they will be commuting to work less

B. As we move towards Zero Carbon, we'll be replacing 'dirty' cars with cleaner ones - though on its own this will mean replacing dirty queues with cleaner queues - good score but no bullseye

C. As we come off Coronavirus, we now have an opportunity to rebuild public transport use, and taxation and other government policy can influence this.

D. As vehicles become more and more electric, Bath's Clean Air Zone will apply to fewer and fewer vehicles and less traffic will divert.

E. The Cleveland Bridge might reopen, or the MRUG suggestion of shortening journeys by linking the A36 and A46 may be considered as a less intrusive road scheme which would result in lower mileage.

Discussion

Interventions short of building a complete new bypass may be effective in providing for future traffic levels considerably lower that would have been expected in forecasts made a couple of years ago. Some of these were in the recent consultation, though there is a view in some quarters that they were included at this stage so they can be ruled out early on and not subject to successful challenge later.

It is impossible (in my view) to accurately forecast traffic levels 10, 20, 30 years ahead, especially at the current time. Yes, we can probably get some idea but there will be a wide splay of uncertainty. The nature of roads is that they cope up to a certain point and then a relatively little extra traffic causes them to fall over with congestion, and regular users looking for alternatives - often inappropriate rat runs. Put those two things together, and Wiltshire Council has a real problem working out what to do for parts of the A350, including Chippenham, Melksham, Yarnbrook and Westbury. Their difficulty is compounded by a potential need to take steps that take years ahead of the situation getting too bad.

I am concerned at the "de facto" standard that seems to be set for the A350 to become the North-South route of choice, rather than the current A36 / A46 trunk routes. I can understand the desire from a "keep it in our county" perspective, and indeed now within the Western Gateway SNTB; the A36 / A46 strays into Somerset which is in Western PENINSULAR. I am also concerned at the separation of the Melksham Bypass consultation from the Wiltshire local plan consultation; asking about housing to be served by the new bypass during that consultation elicited an "out of bounds" response from Wiltshire Council and rendered the consultation far less useful. I wonder if that was intentional.

So - my answer to "are you for or against?"

I started writing this to answer the question, in the lead up to the elections, as to whether I am for or against the Melksham Bypass, and whether or not I will say one thing in public and then take a different approach in private / later on.

At the moment, I don't know if I am for or against. I would PREFER other measures and solutions such as improving the current trunk route rather than creating a new one, and such providing much improved and greener public transport so that private car traffic levels, and fossil fuelled lorries, are reduced. Whether those can go far enough, I don't (yet) know. There may be a case for some relatively small road interventions short of a bypass (and indeed we have already seen some) and interventions which make a substantial difference to greener ways of travelling too.

I can and will listen to what people ask / tell me - but I'm aware that one man's reduction of congestion is another's lost walk down to the canal. And I'm also aware that as a Town Councillor, I'll only have a position from which I can persuade and explain, and not be a decision maker. I can promise that whatever the outcome, I will do what I believe is best, and I will keep checking back with people in the town to check that I remain inline and haven't overlooked elements. Some decisions on a strategic route WILL need to me made for the greater good of the region as a whole, and may not be best for Melksham.

Looking ahead to the future, as plans develop

I will also take a pragmatic view, in that even if a decision is taken with which I and the ward do not agree, I will stand for getting the most appropriate outcome for the ward in that final solution, and I will not take the position of complaining in a pure negative way such that we get nothing. Example - bypass gets built to the east ... OK then, we need to provide foot and cycle ways over a reduced-traffic Challeymead bridge to bring the Hazelwood Road area a pleasant walk and cycle to Asda, Aldi, Leekes, McDonalds and to the railway station.

Perhaps I could gain votes by running a petition or survey to rally the troops. I see it going on elsewhere in the area, with a current councillor pointing at an external "bogey man" when he himself appears to have been caught napping. I don't expect to hear much more after 6th May. Yuk.

If you have read this far - THANK YOU. Sorry it wasn't a "yes / no" answer, but it's an answer that should set the scene for what I am and where I stand for coming years, not just the next 3 weeks. And you can look back at all my old personal blogs and records - chamber of commerce at http://www.wellho.net/resources/Z402.html - public transport (rail) at http://www.wellho.net/resources/Z501.html - cycling and walking at http://www.wellho.net/resources/Z531.html - politics and religion at http://www.wellho.net/resources/Z300.html - buses at http://www.wellho.net/resources/Z511.html . Proud to stand by those; nothing deleted ... all in the open. Current writings at http://grahamellis.uk/perm.html

Take a look at positive options (alternatives to a bypass) which offer long term solutions and benefits that fit in with strategic objectives, stated and unstated. The world IS changing and with those changes, and with other less intrusive and greener changes that could be made, I query the justification. Much of the analysis so far appears, to me, based on pre-covid, pre-zero-carbon data and if likely to be wrong, WebTAG needs updating. And good argument can be raised for a BETTER solution to issues and not a NEGATIVE "we don't want this". I helped co-authour the MRUG response to the consultation - not political, but it may give you some thoughts. I will post a link at http://grahamellis.uk in a couple of hours.

For readers in BOWERHILL - there were fewer candidates for the parish council that vacancies, so you could have got on the council by rights just by offering to stand. There will probably be a further opportunity after 10th May to be co-opted, but that will now be down to the people who have already put themselves forward to choose and invite. In MELKSHAM SOUTH - too late; both Town Council and Unitary are contested. Best you can do is choose the person or people who are most in line with you.

Long reply - in summary - there ARE alternatives; in my view, the best approach is to promote things light on lots-more-roads; if (in the end) we end up with a road - at least it will have been thoroughly tested and probably the better for that. And we will then need and want to work with it for the best ancillary outputs.