§ Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Boswell.]
2.47 pm§ Mr. Bob Dunn (Dartford)I am grateful for the opportunity to bring to the attention of the House the almost continuous and continuing problems that are caused by the extensive roadworks on the A2 trunk road in north-west Kent. I am also grateful for the presence in the Chamber of my personal friend, the Minister for Roads and Traffic. I thank him for his attendance today and for his attention and courtesy recently when, in various ways, I have brought this matter to his attention.
I am also pleased to have with me to speak in support of my case my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Arnold), whose constituents probably suffer anxiety and stress and express anger in the same proportion as my own. My hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw) has also expressed concern about the A2, but this debate is about the stretch of the A2 that passes through north-west Kent.
The House will appreciate that the A2 trunk road is one of the major roads in the United Kingdom. It provides access from London to Dover and cuts across the orbital route of the M25 near the Dartford tunnel and crossing. It is a major access route for Dartford, Gravesham and the Medway towns. The road is forced to take a tremendous volume of traffic—domestic and international, the private motorist and the heavy commercial goods vehicle. I accept, as my hon. Friend the Minister said in a letter to me, that the A2 carries far more traffic than it was originally intended or designed to take. I completely accept that the high volume of usage must go hand in hand with major maintenance to improve safety, lighting and durability. However, does the incidence of roadworks need to be so high and does their duration have to be so long?
My hon. Friend told me in a written answer on 31 January 1990, which is recorded in Hansard at column 608, that since 1 January 1983, there have been 11 distinct periods of roadworks, which have ranged from five to 26 weeks, between Falconwood cemetery at Eltham and Pepper Hill in Swanscombe in my constituency. Adjusted to reflect current prices and including work in hand, the cost of those works amounts to more than £16 million. As the House will appreciate, the cost of those essential roadworks can be measured perfectly in terms of public expenditure. That is not in doubt.
The issue is the personal cost to thousands of drivers, whether local, national or international, in terms of anxiety, stress and delay. What is the cost to our regional and national economy of delayed goods and services? What is the impact on employees and managers in private and in public undertakings who feel that they have been through the wringer before they start a day's work?
I want to put the matter in the context of north-west Kent. For historical and geographical reasons, my constituents have to rely on only two forms of transport access to London. More than 40 per cent. of my constituents are commuters so they have perforce to rely on British Rail—that is another story for another day—or the petrol engine. Unlike other home counties, we do not have the alternative of a regular bus service or a tube system. As my hon. Friend knows from exchanges in the Chamber, there has been total agreement that the 1178 Dartford north loop line—the railway line that connects the London termini with Dartford, Gravesham and the Medway towns—is the worst line and the worst service in the whole of Network SouthEast. In terms of the national network of railway services, it is by far the worst.
My constituents are faced by a railway service which causes great difficulties or by using the petrol engine. For my constituents, who have to be at their place of work by 8 am, 8.30 am or 9 am, in London or in the outer suburbs of London, the prospect of battling with roadworks day in and day out for long periods is a matter of major concern, as my hon. Friend understands.
In a letter to me dated 1 February 1991, my hon. Friend the Minister said:
The work being undertaken between the Danson and Black Prince interchanges is scheduled for completion at the end of February this year.I now come to the most telling sentence:This has been arranged to precede major improvements along the stretch of the A2 between the Bexley/Kent border and the M2.The letter continues:That work is scheduled for completion by the end of 1992".When we examine the record of road works to date, we find that there have been such works for a period equivalent to three years out of the past seven. More than 167 weeks of roadworks have been undertaken on the A2 trunk road in north-west Kent since 1983. As the Minister knows, he supplied those figures in a written answer to me. For three out of the past seven years, we have had to put up with roadworks, the extent of which has been second to none in the United Kingdom. They have been in addition to the roadworks for the Dartford tunnel approach road, the M25 and the Dartford bridge, and have placed us under a form of siege. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister can explain why that has happened. I realise that we do not live in a perfect world, but will there come a time when Dartford will be a roadworks-free zone?My hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham and I realise that roadworks are essential for different purposes from time to time. However, will my hon. Friend the Minister undertake to find out why there is no co-ordination in the roadworks? First, a new hard shoulder may be laid, then a little later a safety barrier is constructed, then later still new traffic lights are installed. All those roadworks take place on the same stretch of the A2. Why is it not possible for an agency—either centrally or through Kent county council—to let all the interested parties know that that stretch of the A2 will be disrupted for one purpose or another? Contractors could then be asked to carry out work at that time. That would minimise the disruption that we have experienced in the past seven years.
For those parts of the A2 in rural districts away from houses, will the Minister consider the possibility of night road work, which is used extensively in parts of Europe and the United States? Roadworks could be carried out at night when traffic is light, and the work could be put aside during the morning rush hour.
Given that roadworks are a feature of modern transport, could my hon. Friend the Minister give art undertaking—I understand the constraints under which he must work—to ensure that roadworks on any part of the A2 are limited to only one side of the road? Time after time, there are roadworks on the London and the Kent sides. My constituents and those of other hon. Members 1179 from Kent, who number many thousands of drivers, cop the lot—to use the vernacular—when they go to London for work or pleasure. In the evening, they cop the lot again on their way home. The time that individuals take to go to and from London is considerable. Whereas Members of Parliament with heavy work loads in our constituencies have time to order our departures and arrivals according to parliamentary business, many of our constituents do not have that flexibility and must leave at 7 am or even earlier to arrive at work. So, if nothing else, I hope that we can limit roadworks to one side of the A2. Roadworks on both sides at the same time are accompanied by confusion and stress.
These are the points that I wanted to make on behalf of my constituents. Again I thank the Minister, who has shown great understanding of this matter. We do not live in a perfect world, but I should be grateful if he would undertake to rationalise these activities and the arrangements for them. I and my constituents in Dartford would be most grateful for that.
§ Mr. Jacques Arnold (Gravesham)I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Mr. Dunn) for raising this important matter. Five per cent. of the working population of my constituency commute to London by coach and car, almost all of them on the A2. They put up with the sort of problems outlined by my hon. Friend. But they put up with those problems with knobs on, the knobs being the repair work on the Gravesham sector of the A2.
Last autumn there were carriageway repairs opposite Gravesend and Northfleet, between the M2 and the M25, along the A2. In themselves those repair works are valuable and they reflect the Government's record roadworks programme. But they are disruptive, so I wrote to my hon. Friend the Minister, who assured me
that a considerable amount of thought and planning goes into the preparation of road improvement and maintenance schemes to ensure that they are carried out quickly and with the minimum of disruption to the travelling public.Now another repair is being undertaken. Last month the Department of Transport abruptly announced the demolition of the disused railway bridges across the A2 at Pepper Hill by Northfleet. Local people were given 10 days notice in a press release. Apparently the Kent county council direct works organisation was contracted to carry out the work. The Department of Transport did not consult or co-ordinate with Gravesham borough council, which, for normal road purposes, is the road agent for the county council.The work, carried out in January and February of this year, was wildly inappropriately timed—slap bang in the middle of winter. Needless to say, it took place at a time when we were hit by blizzards and snow disruption. The result was that the traffic was confined to two lanes and queues built up in the rush hour and backed right up to Scalers Hill in the east. Motorists came off the A2 at Marling Cross and pushed through the entire urban area of Gravesend and Northfleet south of the old road.
Only last September, Gravesham borough council agreed its winter emergency plan with the Kent county council. In the event, traffic went down side roads that 1180 were not prepared for salting and gritting, as main roads are. The result was chaos in residential areas of south Gravesend and south Northfleet.
Will my hon. Friend tell officials in his Department that before such works are scheduled, they should co-ordinate them properly with borough councils such as Gravesham borough council, which are experts in local traffic management? That is essential. Let us get the timing right when contemplating these projects.
§ 3.3 pm
§ The Minister for Roads and Traffic (Mr. Christopher Chope)I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Mr. Dunn) for raising this important subject which, as always, he has dealt with directly and courteously. It was also interesting to hear the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Arnold), and I understand the concern of his constituents about this issue.
As my hon. Friends have said, the A2—M2—A2 trunk route is the major road link between London, the M25 and the east Kent coast. It also gives access to the important industrial areas of Thameside and the Medway towns and further east to the tourist centres of Canterbury and the Isle of Thanet. It is the main road link to the ports of Chatham, Sheerness, Ramsgate and, for the time being, Dover.
Dover is one of the most important freight and passenger terminals in the country. We are developing the alternative A20—M20 route to become the high standard main road artery linking both the port of Dover and the channel tunnel with the M25—M26, London and the rest of the United Kingdom network. When that is complete the signposts will be altered accordingly. We have four major schemes in the current programme to complete, widen and improve this route, and we are on target to have all of them ready by the time the tunnel opens in 1993. I could go into some detail on the works carried out on the A20—M20 route. Suffice it to say that progress on the works is going well. I am sure that when they are complete they will provide considerable relief for those using the A2 through the constituencies of my hon. Friends the Members for Dartford and for Gravesham.
Along the length of the A2 in north-west Kent, about twelve and a half miles between the London boundary and the start of the M2 motorway near Strood, my Department has been carrying out a phased programme of major roadworks over the past six years. There are two further main contracts to be started, one next month and the other next year. This length of the road was originally built in two distinct sections. The first, between the M2 and Swanscombe, was constructed with a black top pavement. It has several minor accesses in addition to the major junctions, and at both Swanscombe hill and Cobham hill it incorporates severe gradients on the London-bound carriageway. The second section, from Swanscombe to the county boundary and continuing into the London borough of Bexley, was constructed of concrete and generally to a higher design standard. On both sections the carriageways were constructed with hardened verges, together with lay-bys for parking, some of which were later closed for safety reasons.
The busiest stretch of the A2 is immediately east of its junction with the M25—A282 where traffic joins it from the Dartford-Thurrock crossing. On the stretch just further to 1181 the east and on that to the west of the junction, bypassing Gravesend and Dartford respectively, traffic flows are slightly lower, but the road is busy on the westernmost stretch past the western interchange at Dartford heath where traffic travelling between Dartford and central London joins the A2. Overall, traffic flows are now in the range of 80,000 to 90,000 vehicles per day, of which about 12 per cent. are heavy goods vehicles, making the A2 in north-west Kent one of the busiest non-motorway roads in the country.
Structural surveys carried out in the early 1980s showed that the carriageways along this whole length would reach the end of their design life by the mid to late 1980s. Major reconstruction of the existing road was therefore planned to be carried out in phases over this period.
At about the same time, a review of the longer-term needs of trunk routes in Kent took note of the fact that the A2-M2 route—by this stage a dual carriageway between Eltham and Lydden—was coming under increasing pressure at the London end, especially when repairs had to be undertaken. To meet this, a scheme to provide hard shoulders along the A2 between the London boundary and the start of the M2 was added to the national trunk road and motorway programme in May 1983. It was also decided that the most satisfactory way of undertaking this work would be to combine it with the major maintenance work that was planned. That covers the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford who asked why major works could not be combined.
As well as increasing the operational capacity and efficiency of the road, hard shoulder provision has a very worthwhile part to play in improving road safety. Despite the high traffic volumes carried by the A2 in north-west Kent, an accident study for a period in the early 1980s had shown that the number of personal injury accidents was rather lower than might have been expected. A further study for the 18 months immediately following the first study showed that, although the personal injury accident rate had not risen, the rate of fatal accidents had increased and that many of the accidents might have been prevented if there had been a hard shoulder. The two studies also showed that the number of accidents in the dark was higher than might have been expected, and significantly higher when compared with the lit section of the A2.
As a result, we instigated a programme of work to provide hard shoulders, to upgrade central reserve safety fencing, and to renew the existing carriageways where necessary. That was started in November 1984. It was originally intended that it should be carried out in six separate contracts, those sections in the worst state of repair being done first and with one contract per year. However, because of the extensive nature of the works and in order to minimise the disruption and delay that would inevitably be caused to the travelling public, the number of contracts was subsequently increased to 15, including five for advance works, and the programme adjusted to allow for more than one contract each year.
Wherever possible, the contracts have been let on the "lane rental" contractual basis, which my Department developed to give the contractor the incentive to complete the work in the minimum time possible, while at the same time working safely. Under this system, contractors earn bonus payments for early completion but face penalties if they are late. A series of contracts have been met, and it is not necessary to remind my hon. Friends of what was contained in those contracts. In a number of cases, the lane 1182 rental system works effectively because the works were completed sooner than expected, and as a result the contractor obtained a bonus.
Work has now started on an advance contract to demolish a disused railway bridge, and divert statutory undertakers' plant, west of the Pepper Hill junction. It will be completed later this month, ready for the start in March of the next main contract which will be for both carriageways between the London boundary and the A296 Bean interchange. That work is expected to last about six months. The final contract in the phased programme will be in spring 1992, for the coast-bound carriageway over approximately a 1 km length in the vicinity of the demolished railway bridge west of the Pepper Hill junction.
My hon. Friends have asked two questions. The first is why we had to carry out a major works programme like this on the A2 before other alternatives such as the M20-A20 route were completed and free of roadworks. The answer is that the road was simply wearing out and we had to take action, not least on road safety grounds. That is one of the reasons why such an enormous amount of work is being carried out.
Secondly, my hon. Friends asked why, if the work had to be done, it could not be got over quickly. The answer is a little more complicated. Road maintenance schemes have to be a compromise between getting work done as quickly as possible and keeping the traffic flowing freely and safely. Therefore, it is necessary to plan the activities —including the placing and removal of traffic management arrangements—to optimise work efficiency and traffic safety. The general presumption must be that maintenance works will be undertaken in the minimum time and taking up the minimum of road space, but without compromising safety or the quality of work. To a large measure, these are conflicting objectives, as I am sure that my hon. Friends will understand, and the balance is difficult to maintain.
Properly applied use of the contraflow system has been widely proved as a valuable tool of traffic management. However, experience has shown that, for major works, contraflow arrangements should generally be restricted to about two and a half miles in length, and that the distance between sites on the same road should not normally be less than about six and a quarter miles. That is why, in recent years, there have been more separate places where roadworks have been carried out on the major trunk roads and motorways, although the distances along which roadworks have been carried out have been shorter. It has been done for traffic management reasons.
It is easy to ask why at least one part of the road is permanently under reconstruction. The answer is that we have decided that, because of the amount of traffic flowing through, it is important to conduct the works in a way that will minimise disruption. As my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford will no doubt accept, we can never have no disruption, but I assure him that, in the light of experience, the length of the contraflow arrangements on the A2 have been carefully designed to ensure that the disruption is kept to a minimum.
The sensible use of advance works can also be of great benefit in minimising the complexities and disruption. Applying these factors to the case of the A2 in north west Kent, it will be apparent that it really is not feasible to deal 1183 with a twelve and a half mile length of heavily trafficked trunk road in a single operation, or in a sequence of closely spaced and timed contracts.
My hon. Friend has asked why we cannot restrict roadworks to one carriageway at a time. Despite the extensive nature of the works on the A2, the contraflow has enabled us to carry them out safely while maintaining at least two lanes of traffic in each direction during peak hours. This has been achieved by what is known as the two-plus-one-plus-one contraflow system. That is, two lanes going in one direction plus one in the opposition direction are maintained on the carriageway where the works are not being carried out and a further lane is made available through the carriageway under repair. This arrangement optimises the throughput of traffic while providing the necessary safety zone between opposing flows of traffic and site operatives.
The use of contraflow and the need for fast-lane closures on both carriageways when work is undertaken on the central reserve inevitably means that both carriageways will be subject to disruption through the work site. I am sorry to have to tell my hon. Friends that there is no way of avoiding that. I understand fully the general wish to see roads impeded for as short a time as possible, but with works on the scale of those on the A2 it is inevitable that there will be some degree of disruption.
There is some criticism of the lack of publicity about the works being carried out. We always issue press notices in 1184 advance of the start of all the major road works contracts and give information about the location, the start date and likely duration, for example.
We are currently preparing an information leaflet to give details of all works programmed to take place on trunk roads in north-west Kent over the next 12 months. The leaflet will be available soon from service areas, the Dartford crossing, motoring organisations, post offices and libraries. I can assure my hon. Friends that they will receive an ample supply of these leaflets. I hope that the leaflets will help to explain to people what is happening, why the works are necessary and the great efforts that the Department is making to try to minimise disruption of motorists. At the end of the day, the major investment in roads in Kent will be for the benefit of all road users, and especially of those from my hon. Friends' constituencies. I am afraid that in the meantime a certain amount of disruption is unavoidable.
I can assure my hon. Friends that we approach these matters in a rational way. There is nothing irrational about the way in which the works are carried out, but I would be the first to accept that at times individual motorists—especially if, in addition to the roadworks, they are facing weather conditions which also impede progress—may think that we are taking an irrational approach. I can assure my hon. Friends that that is not so.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at sixteen minutes past Three o'clock.