A12 road

A12 road
Direction	North-East - South-West
Start	London (Blackwall)
Primary destinations1	Barking Romford Chelmsford Colchester Ipswich Lowestoft
End	Great Yarmouth
Roads joined	M25 motorway A11 road A13 road A14 road A47 road A102 road A120 road A127 road A130 road A134 road A138 road A143 road A146 road A149 road A406 road A414 road A1117 road A1400 road A106 road A113 road A114 road A115 road A118 road A123 road A125 road A128 road A133 road A144 road A145 road A1008 road A1023 road A1094 road A1112 road A1114 road A1120 road A1124 road A1144 road A1145 road A1152 road A1156 road A1214 road A1232 road
Euroroute(s)	E 30
Notes Primary destinations as specified by the Department for Transport.

The A12 is a major road in England. A trunk road for most of its length it runs from London to Great Yarmouth in Norfolk. The road forms part of the unsigned Euroroute E30. Unlike most A roads, the A12 (together with the A14 and the A55) has junction numbers as if it were a motorway.

The 84 km section of the A12 through Essex is widely regarded as a ‘problem’ road.^[1] It varies unexpectedly between two lanes and three lanes and has very different standards of width, geometry, access, lighting and lay-bys along its length. For example, a driver going from the M25 to Ipswich on the A12 would experience eight changes between two lanes and three lanes, which are potentially hazardous. In 2007 it was named as Britain's worst road in a survey by Cornhill Insurance.^[2]

Description

Starting just north of the Blackwall Tunnel where it connects end on to the A102, it heads north through Bow, Old Ford and Hackney Wick, then northeast through Leyton, Leytonstone, Wanstead, Redbridge, Gants Hill and Romford, then into Essex, passing Brentwood, Chelmsford and Colchester. In Suffolk, it passes Ipswich, Woodbridge and Saxmundham, then follows the coast through Lowestoft before entering Norfolk, passing through Gorleston and ending at Great Yarmouth.

The same corridor is served by rail with the Great Eastern Main Line serving London, Brentwood, Chelmsford, Colchester and Ipswich, and then the East Suffolk Line serving Woodbridge, Saxmundham and Lowestoft. Great Yarmouth is served by the Wherry Lines.

The A12 and A120 are covered by the highways agency A12 and A120 Route Management Strategy.^[3]

History

Originally the A12 was a Roman road.

A map from 1766 shows the road passing through Rumford, Burntwood, Chelmsford, Colchester, Ipswich, Woodbridge and Beckles, ending in Great Yarmouth.^[4] The 'Ipswich to South Town and Bungay Turnpike' Turnpike Trust was established in 1785, operating between Ipswich and Great Yarmouth.^[5] The trust was wound up in 1872 following the arrival of the East Suffolk Line which was fully operational between the two towns in 1859.^[6] Following the demise of the Turnpike trust responsibility reverted to parish responsibility until the new county councils took over in 1889.^[6]

Since then, a number of bypasses have been built along the road. The five-mile long Brentwood bypass was opened in November 1965.^[7] Ipswich's 'Southern by-pass', now part of the A14, was built in the early 1980s with the Orwell Bridge being opened in 1982, the same year that the A12 Colchester bypass was built.

A new section of the A12, known as the 'M11 link road', was built in the early 1990s in the face of a major road protest.

Initiated in 2000, the London to Ipswich Multi-modal study reported its conclusions late in 2002.^[8]

In 2008 improvements were made to the junction between the A12 and the M25 to increase slip-road capacity, in particular for clockwise M25 traffic turning north onto the A12, and to ease congestion on the Brook Street Roundabout (serving the M25, A12 and local Brentwood traffic as the A1023).^[9]

The bascule bridge in Lowestoft, built in 1972,^[10] was refurbished in spring 2008.^[11]

Essex County Council carried out its own Inquiry into the road in 2008.

Future Plans

Technology package

In November 2008 the government announced a £60 million technology package including variable message signs, CCTV, Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras and automatic incident detection sensors embedded in the road surface to improve journey reliability, reduce delays and give better information to drivers^[12]

Improvements at Farnham, Stratford, Glenham and Marlesford

Suffolk county council has been concerned about the amount of traffic travelling through the villages of Farnham, Stratford St Andrew, Glenham and Marlesford. The developments had been an aspiration from before 2005, and the scheme will not be implemented till after 2016^[13].

Other Plans

Essex county council has put forwards plans for a bypass of Chelmsford connecting Junction 19 of the A12 to the A131^[14] .

In 2001 plans were submitted for the construction of a new junction on the A12 at Cuckoo Farm, Colchester^[15].

There was a proposal to turn the A120 into a dual carriageway up to its junction with the A12. This plan was 'scrapped' in 2009 ^[16].

The A12 inquiry

The A12 hasn't had any significant capacity improvements since the mid 1980s when the Chelmsford bypass was completed. In that time congestion has steadily increased and there is now a 1 in 30 chance that the A12 will be closed somewhere along its Essex length between 6am and 10pm ^[17]. Congestion is now a major cause for concern and in 2006 the A12 was voted Britain's Worst Road by drivers ^[18]. In response to this increasing congestion ^[19] Essex County Council announced it would hold an A12 inquiry.^[20] The inquiry was headed by Sir David Rowlands, KCB, a former Permanent Secretary at the Department for Transport, with Professor Stephen Glaister, Dr David Quarmby and Lord Whitty, three of the most eminent transport experts in the country. It was tasked with deciding how to improve the A12 and prevent the congestion on it estimated by Essex County Council to cost the Essex economy alone tens of millions of pounds.

The inquiry began taking submissions in April 2008.^[21] The Inquiry, the first ever local authority sponsored inquiry into a major trunk road, heard from 24 organisations and 36 witnesses over three days including Department for Transport and Highways Agency officials, MPs, local and regional agencies and authorities, the emergency services, business and motoring groups. Comments were also received from over two hundred members of the public and through a petition organised by the Essex Chronicle newspaper.

The commissions finding were published in July 2008^[22] and its outline recommendations are:

• the A12 as far as Ipswich should be brought up to modern dual 2-lane standards (where not already dual-3), with urgent priority given to the Hatfield Peverel - Marks Tey section

• substandard lay-bys should be replaced; one or more locations off but near the A12 should be identified for secure HGV parking, and an HGV overtaking ban should be trialled

• a wide range of short term practical measures should be introduced to improve safety and reduce driver stress, such as selective speed limits and better information for drivers, and to improve the recovery from incidents and closures

• a New Route Management Strategy should be drawn up by the Highways Agency, in collaboration with local stakeholders, and an ‘A12 Alliance’ should be formed to consolidate and sustain the momentum for improvement

Incidents

Fire closes road for 10 hours in October 2007

An accident involving acetylene cylinders which caused the closure of the road and rail link nearby for 10 hours in October 2007.^[23]

Fictional Incidents: Collision

A crash on the A12 is the focus for events in ITV's Drama "Collision", screened first in November 2009

Detailed routing

Route of A12 from OpenStreetMap

London

The A12 continues starts just north of the Blackwall tunnel at a junction with the A102 and the A13. From here to past Ipswich (including the entire section through London) the road is a Dual Carriageway. North of the junction, the A12 heads northwards as a 2/3 lane Dual Carriageway abeit mostly at street level. This stretch of road is known as the Blackwall Tunnel Northern Approach. This stretch ends at the triple-layer interchange with the A11 at Bow Road where it becomes the East Cross Route. This is mainly a 3/4 lane Dual Carriageway built mainly on Flyovers and Underpasses and was built in the late 1960s, previously called the A102(M). The road turns North Eastwards at the unfinished Hackney Wick Interchange where the carriageways split and the northbound carriageway has a right hand entrance. When the London Ringways plan was being proposed, A motorway (North Cross Route) was to end here and the M11 was meant to extend from its current terminus on the A406 through this junction and to Angel. The A12 heads to Lea. The section from the Lea Interchange to Leytonstone, also known as the M11 Link road was built in the 1990s in the face the a major road protest. During this work the old section as far as Wanstead was rebuilt as a dual carriageway. Prior to that, the A12 started at the Green Man Roundabout at Leytonstone, and was single carriageway west of Wanstead tube station. It now has an underpass at that roundabout, which again is a junction with the old A11. East of Wanstead, the A12 runs roughly due east. It is known as Eastern Avenue, then Eastern Avenue West and Eastern Avenue East, built in the 1920s as a bypass for the section of the Roman road from Colchester to London running through Ilford and Romford (today's A118). The eastern end of the Eastern Avenue is Gallows Corner in the London Borough of Havering, just east of Romford. The junction also marks the start-point of the A127 Southend Arterial Road, also 1920s vintage. At the roundabout, an extemporised two-lane flyover still provides priority for A12 eastbound to A127 traffic (and vice versa). However, the A12 now veers roughly north-eastward, because it starts to follow the course of the Roman road; the Romans started building this road from Colchester, their original capital for the province. However, the 2.5 miles (4.0 km) stretch from Gallows Corner to the junction with the M25 motorway, called Colchester Road, is still perfectly straight. The M25 junction is number 28; it also marks where the A12 crosses the boundary from London to Essex.

Essex

Originally, the A12 followed the route of the Roman road closely and so was fairly straight, but there are now several town bypasses, so the road through Essex now has several meanders. The A12 formerly went through Brentwood, Mountnessing, Ingatestone, Margaretting, Chelmsford, Boreham, Hatfield Peverel, Witham, Kelvedon, Copford, Stanway and Colchester, but these are all now bypassed, and the A12 is close to motorway standard for its whole length in Essex.

It is this stretch of the A12, particularly between Chelmsford and Colchester, which has led to the poor reputation for surface quality of the A12. This is mainly for its bumpy or potholed surface, mostly due to worn concrete surfaces, especially on the Kelvedon bypass, also between Hatfield Peverel and Witham, and between Copford and Stanway. These bypasses, plus the Chelmsford bypass in its entirety, have still not been replaced with tarmaced roads.

Colchester

Built in 1982, the A12 Colchester bypass provides an uninterrupted dual carriageway where the national speed limit (70 mph/110 km/h) applies.

Before 1982, the A12 took a route much closer to Colchester itself, and although still a bypass it consisted of urban single carriageways with roundabouts and pedestrian crossings. The old bypass is, of course, still in existence – the western half is now part of the A1124 and the eastern half part of the A133.

Suffolk

The Suffolk stretch of the A12 starts with the Capel St Mary by-pass. Originally the route from the Northern end of this bypass ran through the villages of Washbrook and Copdock and into Ipswich. When Ipswich's Southern by-pass was built in the early 1980s, the route picked up from the northern Capel St Mary junction (now numbered 32b), to pass to the West of the original line – this allowed the relevant ground works and interchanges to be completed with minimal traffic disruption. The old dual carriageway through Washbrook and Copdock is blocked off at White's Corner and was renumbered to be the C475.^[24] A footpath still exists which enables passage underneath the A14.

Ipswich

The A12 (multiplexed with the A14) passes over The Orwell Bridge south of Ipswich

The old route through Ipswich was renumbered as the A1214 following construction of the Ipswich Southern By-pass. The old route is more locally known by the road names, notably "London Road" to the Town Centre and Woodbridge Road out the other side. The Ipswich Southern By-pass allows the A12 to overlap the A14 to Seven Hills Interchange, seven miles from the Copdock junction, where the A12 reappears and heads North. As the A14 the road passes over the large Orwell Bridge with total length of 1,287 metres. This has a summit at 43 meters above the river giving a humped feel with reduced visibility for traffic. There are at-grade roundabout junctions past BT Adastral Park at Martlesham and around the Woodbridge bypass.

For most of its remaining length through Suffolk the A12 is a mostly single carriageway road and in many places its speed limit is less than the national limit, for example as it passes through towns and villages. During 2003/2004 some of these speed restrictions were further reduced from 40 mph to 30 mph. There are, though, a few stretches of dual carriageway between the Woodbridge bypass and Lowestoft (at Wickham Market, Saxmundham, Wangford and Kessingland).This section of the A12 was detrunked in 2001 as part of the Highways Agency's streamlining of its Trunk Road Network. Control was therefore passed to the local authorities.

Just south of Blythburgh, the old milestone shows it is 100 miles to London.

Lowestoft

The A12 runs through Lowestoft for about 5 miles (8.0 km) on urban 30 mph (48 km/h) limited roads, however as of June 2006 the A12 now follows the course of the new single carriageway 40 mph Southern Relief Road that joins the original A12 at Lowestoft bascule bridge. A further impediment is the harbour bridge, which has three lanes, the centre lane operating as a one-way addition to whichever direction of flow is deemed greater according to time of day.

An alternative route avoiding Lowestoft is available through Oulton Broad (the town of), but again via urban roads and a bridge (A1117).

The A12 passes over Breydon Bridge to the west of Great Yarmouth.

The presence of these bridge choke points can cause serious disruption to north-south trunk traffic, especially when local traffic is added during rush hours.

An adequate bypass for Lowestoft would need to be well to the west, even to the west of Oulton Broad (the body of water), and its route would have to consider the great areas of marshland in that area. For that reason an often discussed compromise is a third bridge, crossing Lake Lothing, linking the sections of urban spine-road that run approximately along the western edge of Lowestoft.

Norfolk

Gorleston

From a point just south west of the mouth of the River Yare, northwards to the point where it crosses the River Yare in Great Yarmouth, the A12 now follows the route originally used by the railway line from Lowestoft to its terminus north of Breydon Bridge^[25] at Vauxhall Roundabout where the A47 also terminates.^[26]

References

External links

• Society for All British Road Enthusiasts entry for the A12
• Henham Park, 100 miles to London — Milestone Web

v • d • e A roads in Zone 1 of the Great Britain road numbering scheme A1 · A10 · A11 · A12 · A13 · A14 · A15 · A16 · A17 · A18 · A19 A100 · A101 · A102 · A103 · A104 · A105 · A106 · A107 · A109 · A110 · A111 · A118 · A120 · A124 · A127 · A129 · A130 · A135 · A140 · A143 · A146 · A148 · A149 · A151 · A153 · A156 · A157 · A158 · A159 · A160 · A165 · A167 · A168 · A170 · A171 · A172 · A173 · A174 · A177 · A179 · A180 · A182 · A183 · A189 · A194 A1000 · A1010 · A1018 · A1058 · A1066 · A1068 · A1073 · A1078 · A1079 · A1081 · A1082 · A1085 · A1086 · A1101 · A1107 · A1151 · A1156 · A1198 · A1200 · A1202 · A1205 · A1231 · A1300 · A1303 · A1309 List of A roads in Zone 1 · List of B roads in Zone 1

Coordinates: 52°36′44″N 1°42′54″E / 52.61234°N 1.71499°E / 52.61234; 1.71499