A595 road

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Coordinates: 54°30′39″N 3°33′00″W / 54.5108°N 3.5499°W / 54.5108; -3.5499 (A595 road)
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

A595 shield
A595
Major junctions
North end
A590
South endDalton-in-Furness
54°09′50″N 3°11′20″W / 54.1639°N 3.1888°W / 54.1639; -3.1888 (A595 road (southern end))
Location
Country
Primary
destinations
Workington
Whitehaven
Barrow-in-Furness
Road network

The A595 is a

primary route in Cumbria, in Northern England that starts in Carlisle, passes through Whitehaven and goes close to Workington, Cockermouth and Wigton. It passes Sellafield and Ravenglass before ending at the Dalton-in-Furness by-pass, in southern Cumbria, where it joins the A590 trunk road. The road is mostly single carriageway, apart from in central Carlisle, where it passes the castle as a busy dual carriageway road named Castle Way, and prior to that as Bridge Street and Church Street, where it passes close to the McVitie's or Carr's biscuit
factory. The Lillyhall bypass is also dual carriageway.

The road in the

A66
.

At Duddon Bridge and at Dove Ford near Grizebeck the road passes through farmyards.

Route

Northern section

The 85-mile (137 km) long A595 is also known as the Cumbrian Coast Road despite much of the road following in an inland route. Starting at the Hardwicke Circus roundabout junction with the

better source needed
] A further roundabout was constructed in 2011 around 1 mile south of Carlisle in anticipation of increased traffic for a nearby garden centre development.

The route continues in a south-westerly direction until it reaches a roundabout on the outskirts of

A596 terminates in Workington.[1]

The road then continues in a southerly direction, passing close to the town of

B5305 towards Penrith. The twin transmitters of Caldbeck and Sandale are visible close to this section of the road.[1]

The next section follows a meandering path through several hamlets, before reaching the village of

A591, the only passable route to anywhere north of the River Derwent was via the A66 and M6 to Carlisle – a diversion of over 90 miles (140 km).[1]

At this point the road turns towards Lillyhall, passing through Lillyhall Industrial Estate and joining the Distington bypass, constructed in 2008. This section of road is notable as it is the only section of national speed limit dual carriageway along the whole length of the road. The end of the dual carriageway section is a roundabout junction near Lowca rejoining the original A595 road. It is then a short journey along the coast to the edge of Whitehaven.[1]

Southern section

The road passes through Loop Road North & Loop Road South in Whitehaven passing the suburbs of the Highlands, Hill Crest and Hensingham. It forms the Hensingham bypass at this section, constructed in the 1980s to ease the passage of construction traffic to Sellafield through a particularly narrow and busy section of the road. It then passes close to West Cumberland Hospital and West Lakes Science & Technology Park. There is a campaign to build a bypass from the recently built Distington Bypass to this part of the A595 to ease congestion in the Whitehaven area.[1]

After this, the road the passes near to Moor Row and through the centre of Bigrigg, before heading downhill to Egremont. The northbound side of the road here was upgraded in the 1980s to provide an extra uphill lane for overtaking due to the steep gradient. At the bottom of the hill the roundabout forms a junction with the B5086 which gives access to Cleator Moor and eventually Cockermouth.[1]

The A595 the forms the

BNFL in local infrastructure following the siting of the THORP reprocessing plant at Sellafield. Prior to the bypass, the A595 originally passed right through the middle of town of Egremont. Once past the village of Thornhill, you can then see the sprawling Sellafield nuclear site. Twin cooling towers previously dominated the skyline here. However, they were demolished in 2007.[1]

The road then passes

Waberthwaite and Bootle and round the foot of Black Combe.[1][3]

At Whicham the road has a

A590 forming another TOTSO. This is also the point at which the A595 ceases to be the boundary to the Lake District National Park.[1][3]

The road finally passes through

A590
.

The last section of the road is particularly narrow and even passes through a farmyard, though plans have been approved to bypass this with the original road anticipated to become private access. [4]

Safety

The road, along with the A66, is considered to be the most dangerous road in Cumbria.[5] There are several accident blackspots along the length of the road. One of the most notable is the stretch through Moota, which is regularly the scene of fatal accidents.[6] The northern section was formerly a trunk road, but until the recent completion of the Distington Bypass it had only one small section of dual carriageway. The southern section of the road around New Mill does not have a secondary route. When this section is closed due to an accident or roadworks, the detour routes are via Wrynose and Hardknott mountain passes for cars, and via the M6 J40 for HGVs, the latter being a detour of 120 miles (190 km).[7] The poor safety record of the road is highlighted by signs erected on the route stating "1245 casualties in 5 years".

Road schemes

Carlisle Northern Development Route (A689)

The Carlisle Northern Development Route (CNDR) is a 5-mile (8.0 km) long north-western bypass of Carlisle, which replaced the main road through the city (Wigton Road, Church Street, Bridge Street and Castle Way) and diverted traffic from the city's roads. The road is single carriageway, with a number of roundabout junctions, as well as a new bridge over the River Eden. The route begins near Newby West (to the west of the city), before meeting the B5307 (the road to Abbeytown). Shortly afterwards it crosses over the River Eden, and curves round to the north of the Kingstown Industrial Estate, and terminates at Junction 44 of the M6 motorway.

The development of the route suffered several setbacks. In August 2008 a discovery of a

Credit Crunch. A consortium of banks later stepped in to provide the funding, and construction got underway.[10]
The bypass opened in Spring 2012.

Parton to Lillyhall improvements

The Parton to Lillyhall bypass was opened in December 2008 after a period of 18 months construction. The road runs from the junction with the A596 at Lillyhall to a new junction created close to the A595 junction for Lowca. The new road replaces a winding, narrow section of the A595 which passed through the village of Distington. Prior to this project the A595 was considered for de-trunking, meaning the scheme would have become the responsibility of Cumbria County Council. However, it was not de-trunked, and has instead been listed in the government's Targeted Programme of Improvements.

Whitehaven Eastern Relief Road

Copeland MP Jamie Reed and Cumbria County Council leader Stewart Young have been pressing the UK government for an eastern relief road to take the A595 away from a bottleneck through the town of Whitehaven. The proposed route would connect with recent Parton to Lillyhall bypass, it would then pass to the east of the town, past the newly proposed replacement for West Cumberland Hospital, then finally passing West Lakes Science & Technology Park before joining the current A595 south of Whitehaven. Plans are being drawn up as part of the Energy Coast masterplan to regenerate West Cumbria.[11]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j "A595 – Roader's Digest: The SABRE Wiki".
  2. ^ "OS Maps". explore.osmaps.com. Retrieved 19 January 2024.
  3. ^ a b The English Lakes South-Western Area: OL6 (Map). 1:25,000. OS Explorer. Ordnance Survey. March 2015.
  4. ^ "Residents asked how to improve the A595". North West Evening Mail. 3 August 2010. Archived from the original on 5 October 2012. Retrieved 20 January 2011.
  5. ^ Times & Star – Detrunked A595 more dangerous Archived 19 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  6. ^ News & Star – Cyclist badly hurt in A595 crash Archived 23 August 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  7. ^ Whitehaven News – A595 closure causes major disruption Archived 24 September 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  8. ^ "News & Star | News | Great crested newts delay Carlisle bypass start". Archived from the original on 10 May 2009. Retrieved 29 June 2009. – Great crested newts delay Carlisle bypass
  9. ^ "News & Star | Stone Age finds delay Carlisle bypass again". Archived from the original on 4 May 2009. Retrieved 29 June 2009. – Stone Age find delays bypass again
  10. ^ "News & Star | Stone Age finds delay Carlisle bypass again". Archived from the original on 4 May 2009. Retrieved 29 June 2009. Funding problems for bypass
  11. ^ News & Star – Plan for £40 million Whitehaven bypass Archived 7 February 2009 at the Wayback Machine

External links

Map all coordinates using OpenStreetMap

Download coordinates as:

54°30′39″N 3°33′00″W / 54.5108°N 3.5499°W / 54.5108; -3.5499 (A595 road)

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