Express & Star

More Wolverhampton roadworks in bid to ease congestion and improve air quality

Major routes into Wolverhampton will see more roadworks after more than £200,000 was award to council chiefs to improve air quality in the city.

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Traffic queuing on Broad Street heading towards the Ring Road

Some of the busiest and most used routes into the city will undergo extensive roadworks after the local authority was given a grant of £228,000 from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).

The aim of the works will be to improve air quality in the city as well as reduce congestion on the roads at peak times.

Modelling software Linsig will be introduced to the Bilston Street Island, Horseley Fields and the Ring Road Broad Street.

The software will be used on the signalling at the junctions to try and reduce delays for motorists.

In addition, there will be two phases of roadworks on two of the city’s busiest ring roads.

Phase one will see Ring Road St Davids expanded to three lanes while phase two will see the same work completed on Ring Road St Georges.

The council predicts the work will reduce queue lengths by 30 per cent on both roads.

Finally, the authority is set to consider plans to introduce a two lane cut through on the Ring Road Broad Street for the A4124 to improve flow at the junction.

The report, which was presented to the council’s cabinet on Wednesday, has said that the work will ‘commence immediately’.

Councillor Steve Evans, cabinet member for city environment, said: “Poor air quality has a direct effect on health and wellbeing. By implementing these measures, it is intended to improve pollution levels with a consequential benefit in public health.

“This is to ensure that Wolverhampton does have clean areas and when we’re talking about traffic and congested areas, there can be issues at peak times, we identified several areas around the ring road in our report to Defra.

“Just before Christmas Defra contacted us and awarded us the grant to make a difference to air quality levels.

“On the Bilston Street island we’ll be reviewing signal operations and utilising modelling software Linsig, which optimises the signal operations and reduces delays.

“We’ll also be looking at widening the ring road at St Davids to provide three lanes, and also under phase two we’ll be looking at St Georges as well.

“Some media outlets might say ‘more roadworks misery on the way’, certainly I and I guess the rest of the cabinet will, agree that this is good news.

“I’m pleased with the officer’s work, they have tried hard to find solutions.

“We will try and help traffic flow freely across Wolverhampton and that’s why it is a phased approach.

“Moving forward, the city will see new developments such as the Midland Metro extension, new Interchange, highway improvements, and the use of ultra-low emission vehicles - all leading to a cleaner, greener city.”

This comes after Defra gave the council a £50,000 grant last summer to conduct a study into which roads would benefit from the full grant that was given on December 20.

Defra has also issued the West Midlands Combined Authority £3 million to improve emissions of the bus fleet which will be delivered by Transport for West Midlands.

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