Final Queensway Gateway Road works spell traffic disruption to year-end

Work to complete the long delayed Queensway Gateway Road has now been under way for just over a month, causing inconvenience to traffic using the A21 on Hastings’ northern border. It is due to be finished by the end of the year, though not all are convinced of the benefits its backers claim it will bring. Nick Terdre reports.

The final stage of work – creating a traffic light junction where Junction Road feeds into Sedlescombe Road North just below The Ridge, and connecting the constructed part of the Queensway Gateway Road to Whitworth Road – began in early September, almost eight years after the original start-up date in November 2016.

The project has been at a standstill for several years as the original plan to create a link through the site of the Seat showroom to a new roundabout on the A21 was stymied by the showroom owner’s eventual refusal to move and disagreements between the project owner, East Sussex County Council, and its delivery partner, Sea Change Sussex, over which was responsible for financing the final stage.

Gaining the necessary traffic regulation orders and other permissions from the Highways Authority also proved a lengthy process.

Sea Change having persuaded ESCC that it had fulfilled its contractual undertakings, the county council was no doubt relieved when the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities acceded to its request for funding to finish the road. The £2.5m grant it provided eliminated the risk of the council having to repay the £10m of government funding spent so far in the event the project remained uncompleted, though ESCC acknowledges that it will have to cover any new overrun.

However, ESCC excluded Sea Change from taking any further part in the project, instead appointing Balfour Beatty Living Places as its contractor. It also turned down an offer from Sea Change to use its designs for the final stages under licence. Instead it told HOT that CampbellReith, the scheme’s original designer, is to act as principal designer through to the end of the construction phase.

Meanwhile motorists and bus passengers face considerable disruption over the next three months. Traffic is currently restricted to a single lane from the turn-off to Dunelm to just beyond the end of Junction Road, with temporary traffic lights opening the way alternately to north-bound and south-bound traffic.

This arrangement is anticipated to remain in place until 20 December, ESCC told HOT. At rush hour and other busy periods, there are often lengthy tailbacks in both directions.

Night-time closures of the A21 will also take place from 18 November to 31 January  2025, though the road will remain open during the day. The diversion planned by ESCC for motorists wishing to avoid the works on the A21 is as follows: A21 Johns Cross roundabout – A2100 London Road – High Street Battle – The Ridge – A2690 Queensway/Combe Valley Way – A2691 Mount View Street – A2036 Westwood Road/Hastings Road – A259 – A2102 London Road – A21 Sedlescombe Road North.

At present there is no quick way from The Ridge to the A21. Maplehurst Road, a narrow residential street with traffic calming measures which runs from beside the Harrow pub down to the top of the A28 to Westfield, is closed to all but emergency vehicles. The shortest route, as comments posted on HOT’s previous story have pointed out, is to go down Harrow Lane and through Ledsham Avenue, a residential side-street, turning it, as some commenters have suggested, into a rat-run. More considerate drivers may continue to the end of Harrow Lane and join the A21 there.

Meanwhile Junction Road no longer connects with the A21, although it remains open for the time being from The Ridge end to traffic making for the Seat showroom – this section of Whitworth Road has become a popular parking spot. Eventually the part of Junction Road which is not incorporated into Queensway Gateway will be closed to traffic and converted into a right-of-way restricted to pedestrians and cyclists.

For the time being traffic coming up Queensway from West St Leonards or the link road from Bexhill has to make its way through Hollington and across Battle Road to access the A21, and then join the tailback if proceeding north.

This traffic will benefit once the Queensway Gateway Road is opened for business. However, traffic coming along The Ridge from Conquest Hospital and points east towards the A21 will have to travel past Junction Road, where it would previously have turned, along to the Queensway roundabout, down Queensway to the Queensway Gateway Road roundabout and then left up the new road to the new traffic light junction, an extra distance of perhaps 1.5km.

The same goes for traffic going in the opposite direction.

However, ESCC appears not to have ruled out allowing drivers to access the A21 from The Ridge via Maplehurst Road when the new road is in operation, as it tells HOT it “will review the impacts on the road network before making any decisions on Maplehurst Road.”

While some will find the new arrangements beneficial, others will not. Whether traffic will flow faster also remains to be seen – many schemes to increase road capacity merely find that the traffic volume increases to fill that new capacity. It’s a thorny question for new road schemes which a possible new administration at County Hall from next May may wish to look into.

The Queensway Gateway Road is also intended to unlock the potential of business parks on undeveloped land along its length – green space which some would no doubt prefer to see remain as such. If the economy now gets going under Labour, this land may attract business and create employment, but Sea Change’s recent decision to abandon its application to develop the North Queensway Innovation Park suggests that is by no means a foregone conclusion.

 

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