A major project to upgrade the Burnham-On-Sea M5 roundabout is set to cost will cost up to £6.4m and work looks scheduled to start in 2025.
The Edithmead roundabout next to Burnham-On-Sea’s junction 22 of the M5 has been earmarked for the upgrade for several years to make it quicker and safer for motorists to use at peak times.
The roundabout was identified back in June 2021 as one of nine improvement schemes which could improve the flow of traffic on the A38 between Highbridge and Bristol Airport.
The Burnham-On-Sea M5 roundabout overhaul and major A38 upgrades scheme is subject to a funding award from the Government, and is a partnership between Somerset Council and North Somerset Council.
Nearly three years later, Somerset Council has confirmed that it has formally applied to the Department for Transport (DfT) for funding to transform this crucial junction, at a predicted cost of £6.4m, says the local democracy reporting service.
If funding is secured, however, work won’t start for at least a year to avoid clashing with the planned upgrade to the Dunball roundabout near junction 23, which is due to begin in the summer.
Of the nine road improvements included in the ‘major road network’ (MRN) proposals, initially proposed by North Somerset Council and Somerset County Council, four of the schemes fall on the county council (now Somerset Council) side of the boundary.
The other schemes entail traffic calming measures being installed in the village of Rooksbridge, realigning the Cross junction, and an improved crossing for the Strawberry Line active travel route on the A38 Shute Shelve near Axbridge.
The Burnham-On-Sea roundabout upgrade will see the existing roundabout turned into a ‘throughabout’, with a new priority line running through the centre to take traffic from the motorway towards the northbound A38.
This, in theory, should reduce the traffic moving around the roundabout from the M5 in Highbridge, cutting congestion on the approach to the town.
Proposals were given the go-ahead to move to the next stage and an outline business case was submitted in March 2022.
The schemes were thrown into question in early-2023 as a result of high inflation in the construction industry, with the projected cost of the en tire MRN project rising from £25.1m to £30.9m.
However, the government provided a lifeline in October following the cancellation of the High Speed 2 link between Birmingham and Manchester – with the DfT announcing that some of the funding from the cancelled project could be reallocated to the A38 schemes pending a successful final bid.
Somerset Council confirmed on Tuesday (February 27th) that it would be submitting this final bid for the M5 Burnham-On-Sea roundabout scheme very shortly, and that if successful the work would be carried out after the completion of the Dunball throughabout a few miles down the road.
A spokesperson says: “The delivery of improvements at Edithmead would not be concurrent with works at Dunball. If successful in the bid for funding with DfT, the works would be delivered after delivery of Dunball. We are in the process of producing a full business case for DfT, which, if successful, will fund the throughabout improvements. The full business case being submitted includes costs for Edithmead of £6.4m.”
The Burnham-On-Sea and Highbridge area is identified within the Sedgemoor Local Plan as delivering 15 per cent of new homes in the district by 2032, along with an extension of the Isleport Business Park.
National Highways, which manages the M5, had placed a “holding objection” on numerous planning applications around the motorway junction, limiting how many new homes or commercial units could be developed until an improvement scheme had been agreed.
