At the time of writing, 5pm on Saturday 5th February, the new A34 Alderley Edge Bypass is currently closed due to flooding.
The new three mile route was built at a cost of £52m and officially opened by George Osborne in November.
To reduce the environmental impact, the new road has been constructed in a cutting. It was recognised that this had the potential to cause flooding, due to the area's high water table, so to overcome this the team designed a slurry cut-off wall as an impermeable barrier. The scheme also includes 20km of drainage and two pumping stations. One has been installed at Brook Lane, to take water off the carriageway, and another has been built in Nether Alderley.
However, the first real test from heavy rain suggests these measures haven't been as successful as they would have hoped.
Due to persistently heavy rain, which started during the night and has continued all day, there is a lot of surface water around and many local roads are in a bad condition. As far as we are aware though all other local roads have remained open.
Described by George Osborne as "a really impressive project" the new bypass won the prestigious Builder & Engineer Civil/Highway Project of the Year award at the Builder & Engineer Awards 2010 and was also named North West Transportation Project of the Year 2010 at the Chartered Institute of Highways and Transportation Awards earlier that year.
According to our weather forecast the heavy rain will continue for the next couple of days so the bypass could remain closed for some time.
We will keep you informed when it reopens but if you hear before us then please do add a comment below.
Comments
Here's what readers have had to say so far. Why not add your thoughts below.
Was probably wrong sort of rain; the sort that has water in it.
When did they rush the job? They finished it early, most contractors would have finished it early, as conditions were lucky at every stage of construction, and they were very organised.
Obviously the flooding will be looked at and sorted out, so a few floods will not exactly mean the road will fall to bits.
But then I still can't understand why a north bound entrance slip road off, and a south bound exit slip road onto, the A535 (now very quietly downgraded to B road status I noticed the other day) near the cemetery could not have been incorporated in the construction. There is plenty of room for them. Chelford residents still encounter the Ryleys Lane traffic and the queue onto the A34 near the station in the morning, so the new road doesn't benefit us unless we go up to Bollington Lane, or through the lanes to the Knutsford road. I still await an answer from Cheshire East to this same query posed in November.
Also, the groundworks along the road are still uncompleted, not helped by the fact that some clown in an HGV has driven up the kerb near the Harden Park roundabout and completely ruined a stretch of the new verge. Is there any chance that will be sorted out?
Finally, I can understand the comments made by other people about the long stretches of high wooden fencing - why was that necessary? They are quite unsightly and blot out not unattractive views.
I must finish on a positive note - it is a pleasant enough road to drive along and certainly helps Alderley Edge village which is the prime reason for its existence.