Old A roads

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Richard Fairhurst
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Re: Old A roads

Post by Richard Fairhurst »

There's an as yet incomplete Sustrans route that aims to run along the quieter bits of the Fosse, and detour onto minor roads when the original route is busy - NCN 48, aka Fosse2. It was the brainchild of the (now retired) East Midlands manager Patrick Davis, I think.

Long-distance touring routes aren't really Sustrans' main priority these days so I wouldn't expect it to be completed any time soon, but it's moving on in small steps - I managed to get the Moreton-Stow section signposted as a link from our Cotswold route (though someone has since nicked one of the signs, grrr). Much of it isn't yet signposted but you can follow the dotted lines on a site that shows proposed NCN routes, such as OpenCycleMap.
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honesty
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Re: Old A roads

Post by honesty »

It would be good. I can see the A429 putting people off in the middle section, but it's really not that busy. Below Bath to Exeter could be problematic because it's lots of A roads or just gone completely. The A46 to Lincoln has been dualled and I'm not sure how much of the old road was left for the length. Pitty really as I think it would make a really good full ride. Oh well.
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BeeKeeper
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Re: Old A roads

Post by BeeKeeper »

Flite wrote:The A6, Kendal to Shap. Quiet and spectacular

There must be other bits of the A6 which can be used, for example Carlisle to Penrith is quiet for most of its length.
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Re: Old A roads

Post by axel_knutt »

drossall wrote:The old A120 (now B1256) from Bishop's Stortford to Braintree is OK. There must be loads of these roads.


There's the old A12 Hatfield Peverel to Boreham, and A131 Braintree to Gt. Leighs as well, but they're straight and busy, so I'd regard them as roads for eating up the miles rather than pootling around.
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Cyril Haearn
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Re: Old A roads

Post by Cyril Haearn »

Fosse Way? have a look at an old book by Tom Vernon: Fat Man on a Roman Road
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Flite
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Re: Old A roads

Post by Flite »

The first 5 miles or so of the old A6 north of Penrith gets busy - it's a rat run to the M6 at J41 for drivers from the east (Alston) and from the Northern part of Penrith town.
I think it gets better further north, but haven't ridden much of it
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mjr
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Re: Old A roads

Post by mjr »

Jon Lucas wrote:Do please post any recommendations of similar roads (or warnings of roads that may not be as quiet as we might suppose). As I said in the other thread, I have it in the back of my head to write a short book on these one day, but it will probably never progress further than most of the other books I think of writing! :?

West Norfolk has a few miles of the old A149 through Castle Rising which is mostly lovely (some now C-class, some closed to through motor traffic) and the old A47 from Tilney All Saints to West Walton isn't bad (but a bit annoying to reach its north end via Clenchwarton or St Germans). The eastern edge of South Holland has a few miles of the old A17 running atop an old sea bank from the east side of Sutton Bridge that's closed to motor traffic (and wider cycles, sadly - and it's not really signposted at the moment) while the rest of the old A17 via Terrington St Clement is OK but gets increasingly busy as you near King's Lynn.

A local problem seems to be that once a road is closed to motor traffic, vegetation is allowed (or sometimes deliberately encouraged!) to encroach to leave only 4m or so maintained width and the surface is basically allowed to fail, sometimes with occasional deep chipsealing.
Mick F wrote:+1 for the A38. ... As you get towards Bristol it gets a bit mad, but I wonder if the old coaching road went via Congresbury A370 Long Ashton to cross the Avon.

I don't think it ever did. That section of A38 has been straightened and "improved", with Langford bypassed, but it still follows the basic route of 140 years ago (from looking at old OS maps). Possible routes across to Congresbury were about as narrow or twisty as today and what's now the A370 has been straightened in many places (even through Congresbury), Long Ashton bypassed and the main flow into Bristol redirected to meet the A4 at Hotwells rather than the A38 near Southville. Many of the A38 route improvements seem to have taken place by the mid 1940s, with the Long Ashton and Bristol A370 changes only starting after the mid-1960s... so I feel the A38 was the main route right up until the M5 was built.

Readers of other threads may remember that I suggest using the stonedust ex-railway paths (Strawberry Line and Flax Bourton Greenway) or the roads that parallel them to avoid the mad bit of the A38 south of Bristol.
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Mick F
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Re: Old A roads

Post by Mick F »

mjr wrote:
Mick F wrote:+1 for the A38. ... As you get towards Bristol it gets a bit mad, but I wonder if the old coaching road went via Congresbury A370 Long Ashton to cross the Avon.

I don't think it ever did. That section of A38 has been straightened and "improved", with Langford bypassed, but it still follows the basic route of 140 years ago (from looking at old OS maps).
140years ago wouldn't have been the old coaching road.
I'm going back 240years to the early/mid 1700s when we had turnpikes and mail coaches between towns and cities.

Maps never existed back then and they used visual lists with pictures, and the main roads were shown as straight lines up and down the pages.
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mjr
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Re: Old A roads

Post by mjr »

Mick F wrote:
mjr wrote:That section of A38 has been straightened and "improved", with Langford bypassed, but it still follows the basic route of 140 years ago (from looking at old OS maps).
140years ago wouldn't have been the old coaching road.

Of course, but they're often still visible on the maps. Also, crossing the Yeo Valley further downstream might well not have been possible all year before the rhyne system was built.
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Paulatic
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Re: Old A roads

Post by Paulatic »

Jon Lucas wrote:
Si wrote:?

This summer I cycled a short length of the A5 from Llangollen to Chirk, which was a wonderful ride, along the escarpment overlooking the Dee valley. Most traffic accessing Llangollen seems to use the A539 to the north of the river, leaving the A5 relatively quiet. It's a narrow winding road, perfect for cycling.


We stayed at Chirk with the caravan this year. I will be going back as the Pork Pies from the butchers there are superb.
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Re: Old A roads

Post by Bmblbzzz »

honesty wrote:Not sure about Watling street, but the Fosse way is quiet B road or lane for most of the way from Bath up to Coventry ish. It gets a bit difficult to follow it though Leicester. I think trying to cycle the length of the Fosse would be quite interesting

Immediately north of Bath and certainly until just past Malmesbury some stretches are not even quiet lane, but byway. Unfortunately there's a gap just before Kemble.
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honesty
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Re: Old A roads

Post by honesty »

It's pretty much rideable from Bath all the way to Leicester with the exception of the Cotswolds airport even if some of it would be on byways or farmers tracks.
drossall
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Re: Old A roads

Post by drossall »

AM7 wrote:I live just off the old A11 (now B1383) in North Essex. It's not too bad to cycle on. There's a nice old video here showing what it was like in the 70 s before the M11 opened.

Familiar roads in that video. I remember time trialling on the Newport and Littlebury section in the early 1980s - although the history of that course goes way back, as the 32nd Association shows.

All the same, it's not actually my favourite road to ride on now, as there is still traffic and relatively high speeds on narrow roads.
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RickH
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Re: Old A roads

Post by RickH »

Jon Lucas wrote:This summer I cycled a short length of the A5 from Llangollen to Chirk, which was a wonderful ride, along the escarpment overlooking the Dee valley. Most traffic accessing Llangollen seems to use the A539 to the north of the river, leaving the A5 relatively quiet. It's a narrow winding road, perfect for cycling.

I've only cycled under that bit of the A5!

Through the canal tunnel. I've ridden the canal towpath there a number of times - joining &/or leaving the canal at Chirk Bank - mostly taking groups to the aqueduct & back, but a couple of times we've taken the tandem along the towpath through to/from Berwyn (once each way as part of separate round trips).

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Bmblbzzz
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Re: Old A roads

Post by Bmblbzzz »

honesty wrote:It's pretty much rideable from Bath all the way to Leicester with the exception of the Cotswolds airport even if some of it would be on byways or farmers tracks.

Absolutely! I didn't mean to imply it wasn't. Though I've ridden it as far as the gap before Kemble myself (I suppose that is Cotswolds airport – is it really an airport? I thought it was an RAF base now used for storage of civilian airliners?) but I'm no moutain biker, so I think anyone can do it!
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