REMEMBER the traffic jams around the retail park before Christmas and at weekends?

Recall the recent car queues on the A449 at Powick when the gas pipes were being replaced?

Suffering the day-to-day road congestion on the A4440 southern link road when trying to reach Worcester or the M5?

Is this, or worse, our future?

The welcome and positive news (Malvern Gazette, December 16) of the £14.2 million government grant for the Worcester Transport Strategy Phase One, including improvements to Malvern Link railway station and roundabout junctions on the A4440 southern link road by 2016, needs to be put into context.

This money and strategy is only designed to alleviate today’s traffic problems.

It does not take into account tomorrow’s traffic growth that will result from more than 4,000 new dwellings and 35 hectares of employment land that the South Worcestershire Development Plan (SWDP) envisages being provided at the three urban extensions at Newland, Temple Laughern (Broadheath) and Broomhall (Kempsey).

The Newland urban extension will inevitably significantly increase traffic at the retail park, in the Link and on the A449 whilst all three sites will increase traffic on the A4440.

Current county council plans, ie LTP3 and the Worcester Transport Strategy, are generally long term (2025?) because of funding constraints, although they do envisage the eventual dualling of the A4440.

However the county has yet to publish a plan that takes into account the impact of the SWDP developments.

Meanwhile the SWDP consultation document has proposed an Implementation Plan and Phasing Strategy that expects nearly 1,500 dwellings and 25 hectares of the employment land at the three sites to be completed by 2019 but it is exceptionally vague on the provision of transport needs.

Thus, in order to avoid even greater transport misery, the post-consultation SWDP for district council approval later this year needs to include realistic provision for the wider transport needs of the proposed housing and employment land developments.

Moreover, our district council should not approve any plan that does not unambiguously require the necessary transport and other infrastructure, both local and strategic, to be physically provided in a timescale appropriate to the start of the SWDP developments.

W M EVERITT
Madresfield