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A40 bridge repair traffic concerns 'under review'

Jon Smith,BBC Radio Gloucestershireand
Edward Rowe,Gloucestershire Political Reporter
BBC A head and shoulders shot of Terry Robinson. He is wearing a fluorescent orange shirt with a collar. He is also wearing safety glasses and a hard hat with a torch on the front. Behind him is the over bridge on the A40. Three workers are immediately to his right in the background hitting and drilling the concrete on the bridge. There's a white van with its double doors open over Robinson's right shoulder with a car passing through the single lane of traffic set up on the other side. To his left is a large pile of broken up concrete rubble. In the background there are various other construction vehicles, a green tree line behind that and a cloudy sky streaked with some blue spots.BBC
Terry Robinson said work on the bridge was labour intensive

National Highways has said it is constantly looking for ways to ease traffic on the A40 as repair work continues on the bridge at Over.

South West Engineering Lead for National Highways Terry Robinson said the team was keeping the situation "under constant review".

The major route between Gloucester and the Forest of Dean is undergoing a a nine-month repair job.

It has meant drivers have seen the dual carriageway reduced to one lane both ways, resulting in large queues and hours of delays.

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The Forest of Dean MP Matt Bishop has previously expressed his concerns in a post on social media.

Businesses and commuters have also voiced frustrations at the queues.

A photograph of the exposed metal bars on the underside of the bridge.
The protective concrete has come away from the underside of the bridge, exposing metal bars

Meanwhile the next stage of work has begun with repairs to the underside of the bridge.

Robinson said what drivers could see every day in terms of the work the team were doing was only "the tip of the iceberg."

He said: "We're breaking out concrete [under the bridge] that's going to reduce the strength of the bridge so we can only break out certain areas at any one time.

"We are working on top and underneath at the same time."

Pieces of grey concrete in a pile on the floor full of rubble. One man's feet can be seen in the picture, with high vis trousers on, and a hand can be seen picking up one of the fragments. The fragment is illuminated by torchlight.
The waterproofing layer has come away from the bridge

He said the waterproof layer which protects the structure had come away.

National Highways said this showed that the work on the bridge was vital as without the waterproof layer the bridge would not hold in place.

Robinson said the work on the bridge was labour intensive.

"It's [drilling] metal on concrete I'm afraid and that's part of the reason that we can't work 24 hours a day," he said.

"We can't do night shifts [because] it's just unfair on the people surrounding us."

Traffic remains slow at peak times both into Gloucester during the morning and back into the Forest of Dean during the evening.

Concerns have been raised about how long the road goes down to one lane traffic on both sides.

Robinson said the team was looking at it on a "weekly basis" and if they could change things safely, he said, then they would.

"We don't like holding people up," he said.

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