Public To Be Consulted on £20 Million Ash Flyover Plans

Published on: 19 Jan, 2019
Updated on: 21 Jan, 2019

Ash level crossing

By David Reading

A public consultation exercise will begin shortly on Guildford Borough Council’s plans to build a flyover across the railway line near Ash level crossing.

The new £20 million bridge will enable Network Rail to remove the level crossing, and, if successful, alleviate the severe traffic problems that build up when the crossing barrier is down for more than 20 minutes every hour.

A planning application is due to be submitted in the spring and construction of the flyover could start early next year (2020) – with completion in 2021.

The proposed route of the new Ash flyover (click to enlarge). Image courtesy GBC.

For traffic heading in the Guildford direction, the route – shown in our image – will take vehicles from Ash Church Road (the A323), right into Foreman Road, where they will join a new roundabout roughly where the access is to the Ellsworth Park development. Traffic will then pass across the railway via the new flyover, through the new Copperwood development, joining the roundabout at the end of Ash Hill Road (the Dover Arms site). That roundabout will be upgraded.

There are also plans for a new footbridge with a lift and stairs serving passengers using Ash Station. Network Rail, which is providing the funding for this, told Dragon NEWS: “We are working closely with Guildford Borough Council to help them develop options for a new footbridge, which is currently at the early development stage.”

The cost of the flyover will be met from different sources:

• £10 million has provisionally been granted by the Government body Homes England
• £2.5 million will come from Network Rail. A condition, says Network Rail, is that the scheme results in the closure of the crossing

The shortfall of £7.5 million will come, it is hoped, from developers including Bewley Homes

Bewley told us in a statement: “We are very proud of the contributions we make to the communities in which we create homes – both in terms of our charitable contributions and our Section 106 payments. It is central to our ethos for us to give something back to the communities in which we both live and work. We have agreed to make a contribution towards the new bridge as part of our revised proposals for our site at Ash Lodge Drive and this will be secured in the Section 106.”

In general terms, Section 106 covers the legal obligations and contributions a developer has to the local community when planning permission is granted for new developments.

Bewley has permission to build 481 homes on land known as Ash Meadows, south of Ash Lodge Drive. But this is just part of the overall picture. Within ten years, developers will probably have built a total of 2,000 new homes in the local area. This is a key reason why the council believes the new railway flyover is needed. The A323 through Ash is frequently congested, particularly in the early morning and evening, and traffic is often backed up in both directions.

The number of trains using the line is likely to increase in the future, with Great Western Railway planning to raise the number of their services to three trains per hour.

One of the issues needing to be addressed will be the car parking for rail travellers using the station. A plan has not yet been agreed, but the present on-street parking along Foreman Road is likely to be prohibited by double yellow lines.

In view of the fact that the opening of the new flyover is at least two years away, people are concerned that in the short-to-medium term, the traffic problems in Ash will get worse as more new homes are occupied. Bewley has told us that the Ash Meadows development, known as Nursery Drive, will be delivered in phases, with the first occupations due in the spring of this year.

Other important questions being asked by Ash residents include:

What will be the overall height of the bridge? The answer is that Network Rail requires that the bridge ‘clears’ the railway line by six metres minimum. The council says the height would be comparable to a two-storey house.

And what about noise from traffic passing over the new bridge? The council says the green corridor and planting along embankments would provide some noise relief and it is located away from existing housing.

The public consultation exercise will include drop-in events at the Ash Centre in Ash Hill Road on two dates in January. Anyone interested in the scheme can view the proposals for the road bridge, meet the project team and ask questions. Wednesday, 23rd January, between 3pm and 7pm Thursday, 24th January 2019, between 4pm and 8pm.

As part of the public consultation exercise, you can also email your questions and comments to the council at this address: major.projects@guildford.gov.uk

The Dragon welcomes your comments on the flyover scheme.

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