Saltash Transport

Strategy Development

Appendix D – Transport

Strategy

September 2016

Transportation Saltash’s Transport Strategy sits within the context of Council’s overarching transport strategy, Connecting Cornwall (see www.cornwall.gov.uk).

Situated on one of two trunk roads into Cornwall, Saltash is the gateway to Cornwall from . There are over 7,000 daily commuter trips between South East Cornwall and Plymouth and the vast majority of these are from Saltash. This is partly due to an imbalance between housing and jobs in the town with 43% of the town’s working population commuting to Plymouth. This presents a challenge in reducing the number and length of trips generated in the town. The high frequency of bus services to Plymouth makes bus more attractive than rail for commuting. Consequently the rail network is underutilised (1% of the town’s working population travel to work by rail). Despite the strong bus network, 67% of travel to work trips are still made by car. The demand to travel to Plymouth for employment and shopping puts pressure on the Tamar crossings and recent study work has identified a number of capacity improvements to the bridge and surrounding network capacity that will be required in the longer term. This includes improvements to the cycle routes between Plymouth and Saltash.

The Transport Strategy for Saltash is illustrated in Figure 1 and seeks to address a number of issues:

 Carkeel junction provides the main point of access to the majority of the town’s industrial estates, the planned new neighbourhood at Broadmoor (Policy SLT-UE1) and the town itself. Accommodating a range of traffic, travelling between Plymouth, Saltash, South East Cornwall and beyond, this junction is already operating over capacity. has secured Growth Deal funding to deliver a capacity improvement at this junction and this is due to be completed in 2017. This will unlock development in the town, improve journey times and inter regional connectivity.

 The B3271/New Road junction and the A38/B3271 on slip junction are predicted to be over capacity by 2030. Capacity and signalling improvements will also be required at these junctions.

 The A38 creates severance between the town and the proposed growth area of Saltash, Broadmoor. This poses a challenge for the new development to achieve sustainable trips. It is important that investment is targeted to walking, cycling and public transport improvements, in order to encourage increased use of these more sustainable modes of travel to mitigate the traffic impacts and to provide travel options for people who do not have access to, or cannot afford to run a car. This includes a pedestrian bridge over the A38 connecting the Broadmoor site to the town, plus traffic calming along the A388 between Carkeel village and Carkeel junction to promote safety and walking and cycling. (This is in addition to the recently completed pedestrian bridge over the A38 at Carkeel).

The strategy schemes are identified below in Table 1.

Table 1: Transport Strategy Projects Scheme type Scheme Comment Junction Carkeel Roundabout Situated on the trunk improvements/traffic Phase 1 and overbridge road the Carkeel management roundabout already Carkeel Roundabout operates over capacity Phase 2 (larger junction, and will require widening signalisation) if the growth planned for the town is to be B3271/New Road delivered. The junction B3271/New Road signalised junction is also A38/B3271 expected to come under Road on slip (widening) significant pressure by 2030 and the A38/B3271 Stoketon Cross Liskeard Road on slip will Roundabout scheme also need upgrading in Rood’s Corner junction order to accommodate roundabout scheme, predicted traffic growth. Carkeel The A38/Stoketon Cross junction will need to be upgraded to roundabout to allow access to employment land allocation and mitigate potential congestion resulting from development. Rood’s corner junction will require an improvement to support diversion of south bound traffic from the A388.

A388 traffic calming To support a diversion of traffic and make pedestrian and cycling trips more attractive along the A388, calming measures will be introduced to drive down speed.

Rail improvements Station frontage and Improved access and access improvements legibility of walking and cycling routes to the stations; additional cycle storage; the provision of a half-hourly mainline rail service between and Exeter.

Bus improvements Bus services and The One Public Transport infrastructure/RTPI System for Cornwall (OPTSC) project will deliver a high quality, accessible and integrated public transport network for Cornwall by December 2018. Work is underway to identify improvements to bus services, infrastructure, information, ticketing and branding that will significantly improving the offering to both existing passengers and non-users to improve the appeal of public transport, driving up patronage on bus and rail, making the network more financially viable. The improvements to bus, rail and ferry integration will be implemented to tie in with the delivery of a new rail timetable which provides 2 trains per hour on the mainline in Cornwall in December 2018.

Walking/cycling Town wide cycle network Enhanced pedestrian and improvements including cycle network to include designated cycle lanes and improved crossing points linking residential areas with key destinations, such as the town centres, schools and the main employment centres. Pedestrian crossings to improve safety and promote walking.

Due to the cumulative impact of development across the town, both highway capacity improvements and sustainable transport measures will need to be implemented to ensure future resilience of the town’s transport network. In addition to this and in line with current practice, developers of larger schemes will also be expected to produce comprehensive travel plans as part of their planning application. These will identify the specific, detailed on site improvements that may also be required as a result of more detailed transport modelling.