Traffic strategy will hit Wincheap

You report the Canterbury draft transport strategy is to create four major routes to divert vehicles away from traffic hotspots (Plan To Tackle Congestion In City Goes To County Hall, Kentish Gazette, July 2).

The one which concerns me is the slip road off the coastbound A2 at Wincheap and the new road through the Wincheap Industrial Estate, coming out onto the A28 next to the Maiden’s Head pub.

Far from diverting vehicles away from traffic hotspots, this will create the mother and father of a bottle neck in Canterbury on the A28 at its junction with Simmonds Road at the Maiden’s Head pub.

The back up of traffic currently on the A28 through Wincheap and Thanington is already bad but this new proposal could make it far worse with jams all the way possibly to Chartham!

Just to add a little grist to this mill, this hotspot will be further exacerbated by the proposed construction of a new 750-house estate, called Thanington Park, behind the current Thanington Estate.

As no other routes have been or are proposed to be constructed all the traffic from this new estate will access the A28 through Thanington Estate via St Nicholas Road and Strangers Lane.

The majority is likely to use the A28 through Wincheap into Canterbury, if they can turn right onto the A28.

The only other exit from this new estate is onto the northbound (Faversham) A2.

What is so shocking about this new estate, an exception site on the city planning document, is that proposed areas of this site, the new allotments, the park and ride, and the business park, are unlikely to be used and may well be rezoned for housing and thus the number of houses and traffic will increase.

Furthermore, once this estate is completed then developers will have an angle whereby further houses could be built up to Newhouse Lane, Iffin Lane, Hollow Lane and possibly even Nackington Road!

If this latter plan comes to fruition then yet another traffic hotspot will be created on the Nackington Road/Old Dover Road junction by the Kent cricket ground. Andy Robinson Grays Way, Thanington, Canterbury

The plans Canterbury City Council is submitting to County Hall will do nothing to ease the traffic congestion in Canterbury.

A couple of the suggestions have some merit, namely the plan to bypass the Sturry level crossing and the extra slip road off the A2 bypass at Wincheap.

But both of these proposals are flawed, as they will only direct more traffic onto roads that are already very busy and congested.

Fortunately the city council does not have the money to enact these schemes and private developers are unlikely to invest their money in projects that will yield little or no benefit!

Traffic congestion in Canterbury is caused by traffic being forced to go almost into the centre of Canterbury to get to the other side, there being no alternative roads available other than the narrow country lanes.

The city council would do far better devoting their efforts to persuading the Kent County Council to consider an extension of the A2 bypass around the south of the city.

This would allow traffic to flow freely around the city and only turn in at the appropriate junction if it needed to do so, thus avoiding the city centre.

Now that the Kent County Council’s extensive road building programme at the east end of Kent in nearing completion, perhaps they could turn their attention to Canterbury’s traffic problems? Mike Armstrong Queens Avenue, Canterbury