Bypass tackles holiday bottleneck

Local china clay waste was used in the construction of the bypass

One of the UK's worst traffic jam hotspots will be tackled with the opening of a new bypass in Cornwall.

The old A30 was notorious for traffic jams during the summer months and for large lorries getting stuck under an iron bridge.

In 2003 the AA listed the road in a top 10 of UK traffic jam black spots, with 30,000 vehicles a day in the summer.

The Goss Moor bypass was opened ahead of an expected surge this weekend of holidaymakers to the area.

The £93m dual carriageway, from Indian Queens around Goss Moor to Innis Downs, near Bodmin is seven miles (11km) long.

It first entered the government's national road programme in 1987, but in 1995 the project was put on hold after a government review of trunk roads, before priorities changed, and work got under way in July 2005.

Lorries often found an iron bridge on the A30 too low

Bypass constructors Alfred McAlpine estimate it could shave 20 minutes to an hour off journeys to the South West.

Thousands of tonnes of china clay waste from local works was recycled and used in the construction of the road.

Part of the old road will become a "multi-use trail" to allow horse riders and cyclists to explore the surrounding moor.

Alun Jones, of bypass constructors Alfred McAlpine, said: "The real long-term benefit is the old road which could change the perception of Goss Moor.

"Most people in the past have viewed it from sitting in traffic jams, but when you get out onto the moor it really is quite a wonderful place and hopefully people will begin to experience that."

Some local prostesters at the opening of the bypass said that congestion would remain where the dual carriageway runs out in the west, at Carland Cross, and in the east at Temple, on Bodmin Moor.