Top Dog
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Road closedwood street , (The narrow bit) will be closed on sunday all day.
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rosco
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Waterboard works, wasn't it for? Hopefully they'll finish in the one day, it's an important road to have closed.
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Peter Dolman
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road closurebelieve it or not the county council when asked by the last town council to reinstate that bit of road to how it was came up with 6 alternatives. One of which was to close it permanently, seems like a good idea I don't think!
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rosco
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Re: road closure | Peter Dolman wrote: | | believe it or not the county council when asked by the last town council to reinstate that bit of road to how it was came up with 6 alternatives. One of which was to close it permanently, seems like a good idea I don't think! |
Why would you want to reinstate it anyway? How was it?
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Peter Dolman
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not sure but the current arrangement does not work. one of the problems is that many people who live in the south of the town don't bother to shop in the town centre.
the other side of the coin is that many who live on the bypass don't shop in the town either for what ever reason.
the other problem is that the bypass created more problems than it solved as predicted by the county highways department back in the early 90's.
the is plenty of evidence from other towns that is that road users will not always follow logic (as defined by planners) and traffic chaos ensues.
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Clunk
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To get from the BP to Chippenham on a Monday morning, it is quicker for me to go up Oxford road, cut through Porte Marsh, then get on the bypass to get to the A4.
The way I see it is that the bypass would of been alright, if they did not build the extra houses.
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Peter Dolman
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there lies the heart of the matter dear Clunk.
the road was built by the builders with a contribution from the town council (which was borrowed and town residents will be paying it off for another 20 years).
the builders in all honesty would not have been willing to build the road without the houses because as we all know, or should by now, they (housebuilders) don't believe in charity!
all the actual evidence from the time showed that while there was some traffic problems at certain times of the day generally traffic flowed freely. the highways department did not support the bypass.
county highways did allocate a £1,000,000 for an inner relief road but this was shelved when lobby groups such as the civic society & the calne project campaigned for a northern bypass.
a roundabout outside the bp garage and road down through the pippen and a new bridge across the river was my prefered option.
i think that would have cutout the bottle neck of curzon street and traffic would have flowed freely. this year is the 20 anniversary of those plans!
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rosco
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| Peter Dolman wrote: | there lies the heart of the matter dear
a roundabout outside the bp garage and road down through the pippen and a new bridge across the river was my prefered option.
i think that would have cutout the bottle neck of curzon street and traffic would have flowed freely. this year is the 20 anniversary of those plans! |
But at what cost: a relief road through the centre of Calne would destroy and chance of regenerating the centre and make it like countless other places that have bowed down before the almighty car! :shock:
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GTB
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"Relief road" is the biggest oximoron any council can come up with because the "relief" is soon congested with all the town's traffic as they alter existing roads to create pedestrian areas or build large housing estates around them. Look at what has happened with the Avenue La Fleche relief road in Chippenham; the Town council made the main high street into a vehicle free zone during the working hours which means that the relief road was now the main road which at certain times of the day is horrendous.
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Local lass
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| Peter Dolman wrote: | not sure but the current arrangement does not work. one of the problems is that many people who live in the south of the town don't bother to shop in the town centre.
the other side of the coin is that many who live on the bypass don't shop in the town either for what ever reason.
the other problem is that the bypass created more problems than it solved as predicted by the county highways department back in the early 90's.
the is plenty of evidence from other towns that is that road users will not always follow logic (as defined by planners) and traffic chaos ensues. |
the by pass is a good idea but it should have continued round compton basset like when it was first proposed.
the biggest problem in the town is the narrow bit it dosnt work.traffic is choas there and people avoid it .
for me i very rarely go in to the town as its quicker to go to chippenham or devizes.
a couple of weeks ago i made the mistake of going to sainburys at 5pm i popped in there for one thing i was only in there for five minutes yet it took 35 minutes to get out of that road and on to oxord road.
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Chepfer
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"the by pass is a good idea but it should have continued round compton basset like when it was first proposed"
As i understand it, the infrastructure is already there to continue the the ring road further west. I think i am right in saying that many of the fields around the northern edge of calne have already been bought by large building companys for future use (ie persimmon).
I am talking primarily about the area opposite CMA (buildbase) then going around the back of sands farm and ending up at the lower compton junction off the A4.
I know surveys were carried out a few years ago and a medievil village was discovered behind the houses along quemerford !
Perhaps Peter could unofficially confirm this ?!
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Peter Dolman
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road closurethe proposed inner relief road throught the pippen was mooted in 1988 and would have cost approx £1,000,000 at that time (funded by the county council). this would have allowed the narrow portion of curzon street to have been closed for good. that section plus wood street could have been paved over and made into a decent shopping centre. the motorbike shop could have been redeveloped (as the owners want) and new shops built.
other areas that are to be developed might have already happened by now!
the eastern bypass which has been discussed for some years now is in my opinion not required.
the result of such a road being built will be an additional 2,500 to 3,500 houses being built. this will result in even greater traffic problems
it will also lead to social problems as house builders have no responsibility to ensure that the services (ie schools, doctors, dentists etc,etc) are built to cater for all that extra population!
the county highways experts stated back before the northern bypass was built that it could not and would not solve calne's traffic problems. in their opinion an inner relief road would have to built at some time but sooner rather than later. the longer it was before it was built would only increase the cost and diffilculties.
the moral of the story is that house builders love and cherish bypasses because they make them more profit. local residents just have to pick up the pieces and carry on with their lives!
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Peter Dolman
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road closurei am not aware of a medieval village at quemerford, there is one on the outside of the northern bypass adjacent to the new cricket pitch. there have been some "finds" during the work on the sports fields which i hope will be displayed in the heritage centre.
i would not be surprised if there are "remains" at quemerford considering the area we live in. if an eastern bypass is ever built then a full archaelogical survey would have to be completed and any finds evaluated before letting the bulldozers in.
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Chepfer
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The village site at beversbrook, is quite an important one. It was a stilt village, the kind you normally find in the somerster levels, where houses were linked via walkways stilted above the marshland ( hence the names porte marsh and Beversbrook (beavers)).
The other site has been found in the field behind the houses opposite the turning to blacklands church. They are thought to be from the dark ages (pre 10th C).
And i think Wessex archaeology have made an initial investigation of the site.
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Local lass
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never knew that :shock:
i went for a walk around quemerford a few weeks back and i will be honest and say that in the 29 years i have been around calne i have never walked around that area.
was amazed by the old mill and all the alleys they have round there.
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Peter Dolman
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Have you walked along the river from piggy lane to wessington park, if not check it out.
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Local lass
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no i havnt i will check that out . 
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Local lass
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what are they building behind the blue screen??
and what was there before?
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Peter Dolman
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What blue screen and where?
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