A1 in Northumberland - Alnwick to Ellingham Consultation August 2019

Overview

We are consulting on the A1 Northumberland, Alnwick to Ellingham scheme. 

This follows on from our options consultation in 2016 and our selection of the preferred route which we announced in September 2017.

This consultation is your opportunity to share your views on the design of the proposed scheme in advance of our application for a Development Consent Order (DCO). 

A DCO is a special type of planning application, which is needed for a Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP). For more information on this process, please refer to our Development Consent for our Major Road Schemes leaflet, available below.

Businesses, local authorities, public bodies, road users and the communities and neighbouring areas can play an important part in the development of the scheme design. Your feedback is therefore essential to this consultation as it will enable us to improve the scheme before we start the planning process.

The consultation will run for 4 weeks, from 22 August to 19 September 2019.

About the scheme

By dualling the A1 between Alnwick and Ellingham, we aim to:

• improve safety for all users of the A1
• support economic growth in the area
• provide a more consistent standard of road with more consistent layout of junctions
• reduce the number of junctions and private accesses to improve safety

The A1 Alnwick to Ellingham dualling upgrade involves widening the A1 to dual carriageway along the existing single carriageway road, for approximately 5.3 miles. The route begins at the end of the Alnwick bypass in a northerly direction where it will tie in at the existing dual carriageway at Brownieside, near Ellingham.

The final arrangement will consist of two lanes both north and southbound separated by a central reservation and safety barrier. There will be one new junction at Charlton Mires, connecting the A1, B6341 and B6347.

Access will be provided for businesses and properties to the new junctions.

An overbridge will be constructed as part of the scheme to maintain access across the A1 for existing public rights of way. There are two possible locations: option 1 Broxfield, as per the Preferred Route Announcement; or alternatively, option 2 Heckley Fence, approximately 1km to the north.

How to get involved

Please take part in the consultation: all of the consultation information is available on this webpage including a brochure with a summary of the proposed design and our consultation response form.

Please respond using one of the following methods by 19 September 2019

Online: complete the response form online below

Email us at:

A1inNorthumberland@highwaysengland.co.uk

Complete the printed consultation response form in the brochure:

Return it using the freepost provided

Post: Write to us at:

A1 in Northumberland project team

3rd floor south, Highways England,

Lateral, 8 City Walk

Leeds, LS11 9AT

Next steps

Once the consultation has closed on 19 September 2019, we’ll review all of the suggestions and comments that we have received. We will take time to analyse and consider your feedback when making further refinements to the proposed design and to develop our planned mitigation measures. We will set out a summary of the responses, and describe how our proposals have been informed and influenced by them, in a consultation report.

This will form part of our development consent application and will also be available to the public following submission of the application. We expect to submit our application by early 2020 and provided it is granted works will start in 2021.

In addition to this consultation process, we will continue to engage with anyone interested in, or impacted by, the scheme.

To help us shape the final design in preparation of our submission to the Planning Inspectorate, it is important you are involved now and submit your response by 19 September 2019. Once we submit our application, the Planning Inspectorate (acting on behalf of the Secretary of State) may examine the application in public hearings and then make a recommendation to the Secretary of State for Transport, who will decide on whether or not the scheme will go ahead.