A34 road
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The A34 is a major road in England. It runs from Salford to Winchester in Hampshire.
A34.jpg
From Manchester, it runs south through Cheadle, Wilmslow, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Stafford, Cannock, Walsall and Birmingham before disappearing at its junction with the M42 motorway just south of Solihull.
The road reappears just north of Oxford, and continues south, bypassing Abingdon and Newbury before finally finishing just east of Winchester, at its junction with the M3 motorway. This part of the A34 forms the E05 European route.
In the past the A34 ran continuously from Manchester to Winchester. The missing section (as mentioned above) has been downgraded to the A3400.
Together with parts of the M3 and the M40, the A34 forms an important route carrying much road freight from Southampton to the Midlands. Because of the volume of traffic, bypasses were built along this route – at Newbury on the A34, and at Twyford Down near Winchester on the M3 – but these were controversial for environmental reasons. (See the Newbury article for some discussion of the Newbury bypass.)
In 2004 works were carried out to allow the road to continue without being interrupted by a roundabout at the intersection with the M4 motorway, at a cost of £38 million.
See also
External link
- The Highways Agency Management Strategy (http://www.highways.gov.uk/roads/projects/a_roads/a34/bicester_winchester/) for Bicester to Winchester.
- The Highways Agency A34-M4 junction improvements (http://www.highways.gov.uk/roads/projects/a_roads/a34/chieveley_junction/index.htm).