The traffic flow system on the Christchurch Way / Stafford Street section of the ring road is to change, with the county council’s highways department looking to speed up traffic flow at peak periods.
Roadworks were due to start today and will last for two weeks.
Vehicles heading past Morrisons and towards the traffic lights (next to the Thai Lanna restaurant) will soon be faced with different options. The left-hand lane will become a left-turn-only lane into Lichfield Street. Traffic wanting to go straight on will have to use the right-hand lane.
Engineers will also create a larger traffic island to create just one lane on to Stafford Street after the Christchurch Way traffic lights.
Hope that makes sense!!
Anyone who drives down Christchurch Way at peak times know that’s it’s perhaps one of the worst bottlenecks in Stone. Hopefully, the new traffic system will make traffic flow that little more quickly.
What do you think? A good move?
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11 comments
Cbrough
My Husband and I started using Morrisons in Stone before the new road layout. The last few times we have visited Stone has been a nightmare it has been taking us up to half an hour to get off the car park. My husband is not a very patient man and has refused to return there. I feel this is a shame as Stone is a lovely clean place to visit and shop, and the people you meet are really nice. We feel that since the road layout has changed it has not worked and is dangerous and caotic. Sorry but Goodbye Stone.
sue
This has been the worst traffic flow improvement I have ever experienced – getting stuck in Morrisons isn’t good, neither is the massive road congestion caused every morning on the A520. The whole traffic jam scenario could have been solved with a few signs asking people to merge in turn – allowing two lanes to move forwards towards the A34 and merging sensibly as the road narrows to one lane passed the Dolce Vita (all I ever got though was abuse from bus drivers) so perhaps owing to a lack of common courtesy we now have to experience traffic jams every day.
Dan Booth
Having tried to visit Morrisons on a weekend 3 times since the new road layout was ut in place I do not think it has improved the situation, only made it worse. The vast majority of traffic at the junction wants to go straight on, then either up to the A34 or round past Crown street car park, and by putting inthe island 50% of the oppurtunity to do so has been removed. This means traffic backed up in the one available lane, with cars wanting to come out of Morrisons having to cut across into the far lane should they wish to continue straight on at the Lichfield road junction, I myself was stuck for more than 30 minutes on Morrisons car park, and cannot see a single good reason for the change.
Jamie Summerfield
Hi Dan – thanks for the comment. Many people seem to have had a similar experience 🙁
Phil Mitchell
I see as you drive past the bus stop by Morrisons there is a new lane sign on the left hand side of the road, as you said Jamie, the left lane will be for turning left only in future. perhaps that is the extent of the two weeks of roadworks. All they need to do now is mark the road and ‘Jobs done’.
Thinking about it, it could make the situation worse, with all the straight on and right turn traffic in the right hand lane.
We will have to wait and see.
Jamie Summerfield
Thanks Phil. I think the major bit of the works is to extend the island just past the traffic lights, which is aimed to deter cars from going straight on in the left-hand lane
Nick Tucker
A long overdue move, such a system could also make the traffic lights unnecessary, but as we know, Staffs Highways love their lights!
Andy Burdon
The lights will have to remain for the pedestrian crossings, but people joining Christchurch Way at the top will have to learn to filter in earlier otherwise the bottleneck will just move northwards to Radford Street and beyond, on to Longton Road. Coming from that direction every morning when the tailback is up as far as Nicholls Lane, I’ll not hold my breath.
Jamie Summerfield
Good point Andy – it’s going to be interesting to see what impact it has
Jamie Summerfield
Ha! We’ll see. I think it could well make a bit of a difference. The huge majority of drivers at those traffic lights are in the left-hand lane, whether they want to go left or straight on. When I’ve used the right-hand lane to go straight on I often get honked and glared at as if I’ve just been trying to queue jump!
Restricting the left-hand lane to left-hand turns could speed things up. But we’ll see…