Renewed calls for long-promised railway bridge

Pressure is mounting on Wiltshire Council to move forward with the long-promised road bridge over the railway line at the Spinnaker development.

The calls followed the council’s rejection of Network Rail’s plan to close the Penleigh Park pedestrian crossing at a Wiltshire Council meeting in October, where councillors raised the need for the bridge and agreed that the chair should write to the cabinet member to push for progress.

Plans for the bridge, which would link Mane Way to the Spinnaker development, have been discussed for more than 15 years and were included as part of the 2015 scheme for the 300-home development near Station Road.

Wiltshire Council says some funding for the bridge is secured but not all has been released. Cllr Martin Smith, Cabinet Member for Highways, said, “Contributions for a road bridge with footway and cycleway provision have been secured from multiple different developments in the area and not all contributions have been triggered for payment yet.

“We are therefore only in receipt of The Spinnaker contributions, which total around £2.5m. A further approx. £1.5m has been secured but is not yet due for payment.

“An initial design for a proposed bridge was prepared in 2021 together with a high-level cost estimate. This identified a shortfall between the construction cost and contributions received. More recently we have begun engaging with key stakeholders and in tandem refining the design to determine if the council can construct the bridge within the limitations given to us and available funding.”

Cllr Rob Smith has called for contributions to be secured before any work begins on the proposed 365-home Mane Way development, should planning permission be granted. “They actually mentioned the sum of 1.4 million pounds in the planning application,” he said. He added that he has asked the council to ensure “not a thing goes in the ground until you pay us that money”.

“We don’t want to end up in the same situation that we did over Spinnaker, where they agreed to pay the money, then modified Oldfield Road and destroyed that for everybody, built the estate, but then never built the bridge,” he added.

Updating the town council recently, he said, “I feel we’ve made good progress. I feel we stand a good chance at getting that bridge in place sooner rather than later.”

Cllr Boaz Barry said a bridge “is the investment Westbury deserves,” with Cllr Gordon King calling for progress earlier this year.

Some residents have called for a bridge to ease congestion on Oldfield Road. However, others have questioned whether it would alleviate traffic or merely shift the problem into the newer residential areas.

Mayor Jane Russ has raised concern about current plans for the bridge and the potential impact on local residents. Earlier this year, she said, “Are the people on the Spinnaker estate going to be happy to have masses of traffic trundling past their windows?”

She added, “Wiltshire Council needs to look at doing a proper job, with a bridge that goes over all the railway lines to the west of Spinnaker. It could then spur off to the industrial estate to the east and meet the A36 to the west.”