In November 2002, the Kingskerswell Alliance officially launched it's campaign with a call for immediate action by Devon County Council over their lack of effective management regarding traffic on the A380 between Newton Abbot and Torquay.

The Kingskerswell Alliance is a group centred round Kingskerswell who want action on the congested A380 but who do not believe that the proposed £50 million bypass is the answer. We believe that by a multiple approach of much smaller, economical, sustainable and environmentally friendly improvements an acceptable solution can be found.

The Alliance call for immediate action on

• 1. The Penn Inn Roundabout needs a flyover, or better still an underpass, to carry through traffic. This would enable the existing roundabout to manage the Shaldon Road / Newton Abbot traffic more efficiently and eliminate the daily tailbacks on the Kingsteignton side of the roundabout.

• 2. Jury’s Corner in Kingkerswell. Both local people and the Parish Council have been calling for a bridge / underpass here for many years. Parents have to risk the lives of their children on a daily basis trying to get them to school and there have been fatalities. The lights impede the smooth flow of traffic and slip roads would better enable village traffic joining the road.

• 3. Kingkerswell Gardens. Replace the roundabout here with a modern junction that allows traffic to have unimpeded access to the Ring Road and Riviera Way?

• 4. The St Marychurch Road should be selectively widened at points where vehicles have trouble passing each other and be linked with the road network serving Barton New Town and The Willows. Better use could also be made of the road from the top of Barton to Kerswell Gardens. Both measures would take pressure off the already busy Barton Hill Road.

• 5. Provision of public transport services that would offer an economic as well as an environmental incentive for commuters to use as an alternative to personal transport.

• 6. Recognise that road building treats the effect not the cause, and that traffic will always expand to fill the road space available. Incentives like flexitime to encourage staggered working hours are popular with workers and avoid rush hour congestion.

• 7. Roll out Broadband services on all local exchanges now to facilitate Teleworking, to allow staff to spend all or some of their time working from home and reduce commuter traffic.

By implementing improvements such as these NOW, The Alliance believes a steady uninterrupted flow of traffic, as opposed to the current stop start situation, could be achieved. This would provide an alternative solution to laying concrete on the beautiful valley west of Kingkerswell.

Alliance chairman, Richard Hamlyn, said “We believe that after making improvements to the existing roads, traffic would be able to flow in an uninterrupted manner at a minimum average speed of 20mph, therefore the journey time would be less than 10 minutes. Is this too high a price to pay for protecting the environment? In addition, if the £50 million earmarked for this project were invested efficiently in improvements to public transport locally the cumulative effect of both strategies would be enormous. If it is found that after making these simple, economical, improvements to the existing roads the traffic situation remains unacceptable then alternative solutions must be considered, but surely the analogy is that it must pay to try and unblock the old drain before laying a new one”

“Devon County Council says they have looked at these alternative proposals and found them not to be the answer. If that is the case why have they never published the details of how they have come to their conclusion? While they are about it they could also publish the detail of where the promised six thousand new jobs would come from if a bypass were built. Do they also have figures of the jobs that would be lost due to businesses in Torbay relocating out of town?”

“Devon County Council has delivered nothing to the motorist on this matter other than endless surveys and feasibility studies costing hundreds of thousands of pounds of tax payer’s money, which could have been better spent on the improvements."

Richard Hamlyn added “We have found that when people who initially may have been in favour of the bypass are informed of its shortcomings and of the real reasons why local councils and businessmen want this scheme to go ahead they soon change their opinion. We see it as a key function of the Kingskerswell Alliance to make sure that people are made aware of all the environmental and social implications of this scheme to enable them to make an informed decision."

“For people who want something done NOW about the traffic on the A380 their best option is to either join the Kingskerswell Alliance or register your support.”