ONCE again Newport’s roads are exposed for what they are – antiquated and inadequate!

The M4 Brynglas tunnel closures causing the city to shudder to a standstill and the inevitable stream of accidents on the SDR prove that we are decades behind the rest of the civilised world. We have endured years of delay, inconvenience and danger from ill-conceived road planning and construction. And now we have another consultation! We are being consulted about the best options for problems that should have been addressed decades ago. Everyone is aware that the best option available – the southern M4 route – is going to be dismissed out of hand because it’s too expensive to consider, despite our pretending to consider it. The only way to cure the agony of Newport’s daily toil is to decommission the existing M4 and together with the SDR, construct an A48 standard ring road around Newport with a new motorway passing to the south that will not interfere with the city. It needs political backbone to do something before the problem becomes obsolete because traffic and the wealth associated with it goes elsewhere, leaving south-east Wales the backwater the rest of the country already thinks it is. There is little point to being self-governing if nobody wants to come here.

Gwyn Kemp-Philp, Transport Officer, Newport Civic Society