More residents asked to have say on £156 million Manadon upgrade

Bespoke meetings are being held with those who will be impacted the most

As part of a consultation to ‘Keep Manadon Moving,’ Plymouth City Council’s new cabinet member for transport says a further 12,000 letters will arrive on  doorsteps this week inviting them to take part.

Meetings are being held in person or remotely with residents whose properties will be directly impacted by the upgrade to improve traffic flow at the Manadon Interchange, a critical junction which connects the A38 Devon Expressway with the A386 Tavistock Road.

The six-week “extensive” consultation began on Wednesday 14 May and includes events throughout the city.

Feedback from residents and business will help shape final proposals

Initial designs include extra capacity on the entrances to the roundabout which gets congested at peak times, as well as new bus priority and improvements for pedestrians.

Work on the £156 million scheme, the majority of which will be government funded, is expected to start in 2028 .

Cabinet member for strategic planning and transport John Stephens (Lab, Plymstock Dunstone) detailed the consultation process so far at a full council meeting this week.

He said letters had gone out in April and May inviting people living close to the scheme to have their say and 12,000 residents from the wider area will get their letters this week. Follow up letters would be going out to people who had not yet replied.

The council is working with communications company ECF which was involved in the latest Armada Way consultation.

Cllr Stephens expressed gratitude to officers and staff for the “sensitive way” in which they conducted the engagement in particular with residents living in the vicinity of Manadon Roundabout.

Separately, the council’s carriageway resurfacing programme this year will cost around £600,000, and includes Drunken Hill Bridge and Underwood in Plympton Erle and Plympton St Mary, Ham Drive in Ham, Fort Austin Avenue in Eggbuckland, Foliot Road in Southway, New Passage Hill in Devonport, Budshead Road in Budshead and Kinterberry Street and Buckwell Street in St Peter and the Waterfront.

A bus shelter would be reinstated opposite Plymstock Library on Horn Cross Road following a 250 per cent increase in bus passengers, and at Southway Drive and Clittaford Road panels would be added to the Chaddlewood district bus shelter on Glen Road to improve weather protection.

Cllr Stephens said changes to the bus network since the decision was made to permanently remove the shelters meant more people are using them.

The Park crematorium bus shelters are under way, cycle and pedestrian crossings would be installed at Stoke and Mill Bridge in St Peter’s, the Woolwell to The George cycle path is forging ahead and the Cot Hill crossing is coming soon in Plympton Erle, he said.