Closed
Temporary Traffic lights Newbury road A4185
Reported in the Current Roadworks - live information category anonymously at 08:51, Tue 22 January 2019
Sent to Oxfordshire County Council 5 minutes later
Temporary Traffic lights installled yesterday on Newbury road A4185 now causing miles of tail back on the A34 dual carriageway in both north and south bound directions. Also caused last night over an hour of delay for thousands of people trying to exit Harwell Campus. This is entirely unacceptable and dangerous. The contractors are meant to be manually operating these lights during rush hour. Reports are they are not being operated to allow more than 6 vehicles through on a fixed cycle (ie not in line with in and out muster for Harwell which is where most traffic will be going to or coming from in rush hour). Given the flow in rush hour this is not going to work. Please tell the contractor to sort it out. The situation an the A34 is dangerous and causing massive problems for thousands of people trying to get to work (and get home after work)
Council ref: ENQ19824155
Updates
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State changed to: Investigating
Updated by Oxfordshire County Council at 08:56, Tue 22 January 2019
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The temporary traffic lights on the A4185 A34 Chilton junction caused sever delays of an hour last night for staff attempting to leave the Harwell Campus. The Harwell campus was grid locked with no alternative route to leave by. This morning, there was a delay of at least 30 minutes trying to leave the A34 to join the A4185. This caused a tail back onto the A34 beyond the East Illsley junction. These road works are causing chaos and severe delays to peoples journeys. Surely these road works must be fast tracked with 24/7 work to get them finished.
Posted anonymously at 09:17, Tue 22 January 2019
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Absolutely horrendous trying to get out of work last night, and over an hour to get to work this morning.
Posted anonymously at 09:19, Tue 22 January 2019
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OCC these three way lights need urgent attention. I don't know whether contractors have not given priority to rush hour traffic, it certainly seems this way. Not that I saw any contractors actually working on the A4185, just lots of barriers. Major delays, with potentially dangerous queuing on the A34 in both directions, and the area in general.
Posted anonymously at 09:26, Tue 22 January 2019
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Absolutely appalling - took me over an hour in the queue northbound and upon reaching the 3-way traffic lights found there were no cars waiting on the other 2 roads and contractors were just standing around doing nothing. If this is dealt with the contractor needs to ensure that the timing of the lights is reversed in the evening.
Posted anonymously at 09:32, Tue 22 January 2019
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The northbound A34 queue is between 6 and 7 miles long and is caused solely by the temporary traffic traffic control at this location. Google indicates a 21 minute delay, but I was delayed by 45 minutes, having joined the queue when it was shorter.
Posted anonymously at 09:34, Tue 22 January 2019
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The temporary traffic lights are not only causing severe issues getting to and from work, but there is also a major safety concern- traffic is queuing up the southbound slip road at Chilton, and onto the A34. This means that vehicles joining the slip road are at times sticking out onto the A34. The junction is just over the brow of a hill, with HGV using the inside lane at high speeds, meaning that there is not enough time for them to slow down between the brow of the hill and the vehicles sticking out from the slip road.
Posted anonymously at 09:55, Tue 22 January 2019
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CHAOS!!! If it didn't happen already this morning, this will end up in a serious accident before the roadworks are completed. Queuing traffic on A34 Northbound from Chieveley (M4) junction, both lanes. Queues gridlocked roads through Ilsley and beyond. Traffic trying to avoid the queues using the rural routes and ending up in Wantage also causing chaos to the road network in that area. When I reached the front of the queue I found temporary lights. The queue coming from Rowstock was just SIX cars long. Just stunned. By the lights 7 men all sat or stood chatting...who seemed to have a complete lack of awareness of the issues caused. These lights should be manned during peak hours to ensure that there is a higher volume of vehicles allowed through from the busiest direction (in case it isn't clear what this is...) morning rush hour highest volume from A34 towards the Harwell Campus, evening rush hour highest volume from Harwell Campus towards the A34. SOMETHING MUST BE DONE ABOUT THIS. The queues on the A34 at the end of the slip road left vehicles very vulnerable.
Posted anonymously at 09:58, Tue 22 January 2019
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Aside from the A34 issues already reported, at the height of the rush hour traffic was backed up on the Hagbourne Hill Road to the new roundabout on the A417. Another issue is parents trying to access Chilton Primary School at the start/end of the school day.
Posted anonymously at 10:13, Tue 22 January 2019
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Traffic backed up way past East Ilsley junction of A34 - nose to tail stationery or crawling traffic. At three way traffic point outside Chilton Garden centre, there was one car waiting to travel south. Please weight the traffic lights according to the flow of the traffic in and out of Harwell Campus.
Posted anonymously at 10:20, Tue 22 January 2019
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Preposterous state of affairs - the number and timing of various roadworks around Oxfordshire! With many people taking alternative routes to avoid already congested roads, 3 way lights are installed around a large scientific campus, causing major delays in the area and for anyone using the A34. As a further insult, the roads will still be in a disgusting state when these various works are completed...
Posted by Mark Popkiss at 10:41, Tue 22 January 2019
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The phasing of the lights is clearly incorrect as there were huge tailbacks when approaching the Harwell campus from the south side this morning, and no queue at all for traffic on the A4185 heading in the other direction. It cannot be hard to realise that most traffic will be heading towards the Harwell campus in the morning, and most of the traffic will be heading away from it in the evening. This needs to be fixed urgently.
Posted anonymously at 11:20, Tue 22 January 2019
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Oxfordshire County Council has recently transitioned to a new system that handles reports from Fix My Street. We are checking a small number of reports, including this one, that are currently marked as fixed on our new system. If you consider this still requires further investigation, please accept our apologies and create a new report by clicking https://fixmystreet.oxfordshire.gov.uk/
State changed to: Investigation complete
Posted by Oxfordshire County Council at 13:20, Tue 18 June 2019
This report is now closed to updates from the public. You can make a new report in the same location.