Cedars Roundabout sparks more debate

Cedars Roundabout in Barnstaple has been met with much criticism, when in January this year, Devon County Council (DCC) announced plans for significant roadworks to take place. 

These roadworks caused many disputes with locals calling for the works to be scrapped and some residents even saying there was a lack of organisation as cars faced huge queues of traffic in all directions of the roundabout. 

The roundabout prior to work. (Image: AW Photographic)

Devon County Council announced earlier this year that work will be taking place to build a new pedestrian crossing down the hill from the Cedars Roundabout. 

The council claimed this would not only help people cross the road, but it would also be linked to sensors in the road on the Fremington side of the roundabout. 

Plans hoped the work would help reduce the queuing at this roundabout for drivers coming from the Fremington direction but have to give way to traffic coming from Roundswell.

The latest update from DCC has said a section of Bickington Road will be closed overnight to allow new ducts to be built across the road, where the width of the carriageway will not permit the works to be carried out in two-halves.

Work is due to be carried out with the road closed from 6.30pm to 6.30am between Monday 29 April and Friday 03 May 2024.

During the daytime, work will continue at Cedars roundabout under temporary traffic lights.

Selaine Saxby, MP for North Devon has voiced her opinion on the matter. 

In relation to the road works, Ms Saxby conducted a survey which showed the level of congestion and inconvenience has dramatically increased as well as sharing potential solutions, which include opening the Old Torrington Road bus gate.

Selaine said: “My particular frustration with the Cedars scheme is that no one was aware before the sign went up announcing the roadworks how long it would take, or the huge amount of poorly planned disruption that would be unleashed.  Whilst staff running the lights have done a fantastic job, why on earth in this day and age can we not have planned the traffic and have an automated system?

“It was wrong that the proposed solution to this situation was to suggest that residents of North Devon ‘worked from home’ on a road that has schools and Petroc on it, as well as being a route for many to get to the hospital.  And it is wrong that no alternative traffic planning was considered, with rat runs now being monitored by the police, the Old Torrington Road bus gate was not reopened, and this all happened at the same time as the overrunning Link Road project.

“All road improvements come with disruption, however, when a project is likely to have as marginal a benefit as this one, residents’ voices should have been heard far earlier as to whether the disruption outweighed the potential benefit.  

“North Devon frankly deserves better and I am deeply dismayed at how our community has been treated through this project and that no compensation has been offered to the businesses whose livelihoods have suffered as a result of these roadworks.”

Within the responses when asked if they think the proposed measures at the Cedars Roundabout will make much difference, the greatest majority (324 out of the 701 who answered the question, or 46%) said ‘no’. 

The second highest majority (176, or 25%) said “hopefully, but the money could have been spent better.”

Question 7 on the survey stated ‘Developers provide funding (S106) for infrastructure, in Cedars case over £800,000.

Some changes would not cost vast amounts of money. Some of the ideas below have been suggested, would you like these possibilities to be looked into?’. The ideas offered included a) stopping cars parking on the main road in Bickington, b) stopping cars parking on the main road in Sticklepath, c) opening up the Old Torrington Road Bus gate to help traffic flow away from Cedars, d) more work at Wrey Arms roundabout as that is where the problem is and e) permanent traffic lights at Cedar. 

Of the 553 who answered this question, the greatest majority (239, 43 percent) voted for ‘opening up the Old Torrington Road bus gate to help traffic flow away from Cedars’.

Ms Saxby added: “I very much hope new leadership at Devon County Council will see urgent steps taken to better join up how our road network is managed and that we will not see a repeat of the traffic chaos inflicted on residents again. This is not about money, this is about planning and consideration of the economic disruption to North Devon from projects that were barely consulted at the time. Had the whole project been better planned, so much economic damage would not have been done.”

Councillor Frank Biederman who has been very vocal on the issues at Cedars Roundabout responded to Ms Saxby’s comments.

ABOVE: Councillor Frank Biederman who is the County Councillor for the electoral division of Fremington Rural

He said: “I feel Selaine is just using this situation for political gain and her survey was just to collect emails rather than to actually improve the situation.

“It surprises me, as she was the one that wanted to close Barnstaple Long Bridge to traffic altogether a couple of years back, without consultation, and it was the intervention of local councillors that stopped this.  I believe it would have had devastating consequences for the town centre businesses and traffic flows.

“Clearly the Cedars has had a severe impact on the public during the works and it is disappointing that they are taking so long. 

“I am pleased that on the whole since the early days, I have managed to work well with officers & contractors to minimise this. My intervention has seen 12 hours a day manual control of the lights, remote controlled lights brought in to allow the operator to better move around to view the different arms of the roundabout, and lights with longer life batteries therefore minimising the times they need changing.

“The traffic in the AM peak hours has been a long term problem through Bickington for those living in Bickington, Fremington, Yelland & Instow after all the building forced on us by central government, that she is a member of.  Officers came up with this scheme to alleviate some of the congestion, which was supported unanimously by the conservative cabinet after a wide public consultation at the time.  At this time Selaine was the MP and also a district councillor for the Instow ward, I don’t remember her making any representations at the time.

“I do remember her criticism of the Council for refusing the 250 homes at Yelland Power Station though, which was subsequently overturned on appeal by the government inspector.    The Government's open door planning policies are putting incredible pressure on the infrastructure to support all this development, not only on our highways, but also health, education, environment etc. 

“She and her government can't have it both ways, you can't force development on us, then jump up and down when they come up with schemes to mitigate it.

“I do agree with her, that after 15 years of Conservatives in control at Government Level and 16 years at County Level, we need a change.”