It is now more than six months since a meeting of villagers in Barnt Green was promised a six-week follow-up to their pleas for traffic calming. As vehicles continue to roar through their village, they are still waiting. Other villages along this stretch of B-road between Redditch and south Birmingham also continue to wait for something to work.
Alvechurch has installed humps, one-lane pinch-points and new signs, yet still motorists prefer to zip through the village while the bypass sits relatively unused.
The reality is that attempts at traffic calming will achieve little while there is no attractive alternative route. Motorists choose to come through Alvechurch because if they use the bypass it takes even longer – oh, and they might get a hole in their windscreen thanks to the poor road surface.
It’s even worse as the road continues through Barnt Green and Cofton Hackett because there is no alternative at all.
There is no doubt life in these villages would be improved if the traffic went elsewhere – so, what if someone were to build a fast link road from Hopwood hill to Longbridge? The Alvechurch bypass immediatley becomes a lot more attractive and why would anyone bother to wend through Barnt Green and Cofton?
As this idea might soon be coming to fruition should we all rejoice? Click here for an idea of the environmental consequences, never mind all the other problems such a road would bring. Then you decide and write in to let us know what you think.