MP quizzed on A27 plan

‘A local consensus’ is needed according to transport secretary Chris Grayling MP who was speaking about the future of the A27.

The transport secretary Chris Grayling said this week that the people of Chichester need to ‘go away and think through what works best and come up with a local consensus’ about the A27.

Mr Grayling was quizzed on the future of the A27 in both Chichester and Worthing while he was at Gatwick Airport railway station, announcing a £150million upgrade project.

He said he was working with local MPS to ‘make sure that a scheme can deliver what people hope for’.

He added: “We are continuing to work on upgrade plans for the A27. The issue around Chichester is there has been a huge resistance to the plans locally.

“What we would never want to do is to proceed with a scheme which had substantial local opposition, not just from residents affected by it, but seamlessly across the whole community.

“We have got a community that is completely divided between the northern route and the southern route – if we can get consensus about what is going to work best for Chichester, then obviously we will want to try and put it back into the pipeline – but that consensus hasn’t happened.”

Plans to improve the A27 in Chichester were scrapped in 2017. In a letter cancelling the whole scheme, Mr Grayling blamed his decision on ‘the withdrawal of support by local councils for the shortlisted options and significant local campaigns’.

The news came just days before Highways England was due to announce its preferred route option.

Last year, the BABA27 (Build A Better A27) community group was formed and put forward two options, a mitigated new northern bypass and a full southern upgrade, but both were rejected by Highways England as not being ‘workable or affordable’.