Residents invited to have their say on steel city’s gridlocked streets

RESIDENTS HAVE been invited to have their say about wideranging plans to ease congestion on traffic-choked roads in Sheffield city centre.

Additional lanes, segregated cycle routes and new turning arrangements are among a raft of measures to reduce delays on the A61 Inner Ring Road and surrounding streets.

Sheffield Council has already submitted a funding bid to Sheffield City Region, and today launches a two-week public consultation.

It hopes to begin work next summer, subject to the outcome of the consultation and funding being approved, and to complete the radical overhaul in spring 2019.

The proposals were drawn up primarily to address concerns raised by firms in the Riverside Business District, near The Wicker, about congestion resulting from nearby developments. They include moving the right turn facility for traffic from Mowbray Street away from the Bridgehouses junction towards Savile Street and increasing the number of lanes clockwise from Corporation Street to Alma Street

The council claims the work will enable growth and development in the city, and provide ‘smoother, safer and more efficient travel’.

It has spent nearly £160,000 drawing up the proposals, which council documents state will “provide improved access to jobs, education and training, and deliver the foundation for a strong competitive economy”.

Views can be emailed to Scheme.Design@Sheffield.gov. uk or sent in writing to: Scheme Design at Floor 5, Howden House, 1 Union Street, Sheffield, S1 2SH.

The closing date for comments is November 1.