A company has been hired by the county council to help push forward ambitious plans to transform junction 10 of the M5 near Tewkesbury and unlock acres of land for housing and employment opportunities. The proposals would see a new slip road onto the M5 southbound and a new slip road off the M5 northbound, to create an all-movements signalised junction.
The scheme also includes a new link road connecting the A4019 to the B4634 in west Cheltenham and widening of the A4019 Tewkesbury Road. Following a thorough and competitive tender process, Gloucestershire County Council has appointed Galliford Try to further progress the M5 Junction 10 Improvements Scheme ahead of submitting their Development Consent Order (DCO) application to the Planning Inspectorate.
Galliford Try will work alongside the council to support them with their planning application, while also ensuring the scheme delivers best value for money and is achieved within budget and on time. Galliford Try will work alongside the council’s consultants Atkins, a member of the SNC-Lavalin Group, to continue ongoing engagement with key stakeholders in shaping the scheme design.
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Cllr David Gray, Cabinet Member for Environment and Planning at the county council, said: “We are delighted to award the design contract to Galliford Try. We are confident that their expertise and experience will ensure the successful delivery of this crucial element of the project. Their approach to health and safety, programme, carbon and social value aspirations demonstrates a strong alignment to the council’s own values and behaviours.”
David Lowery, Managing Director of Galliford Try’s Highways Business, commented: “We are delighted and honoured to deliver this significantly important major infrastructure project. This is a great opportunity to work with Gloucestershire County Council, a customer that is passionate about tackling the climate challenge head on, as well as creating enhanced connectivity between communities, a passion we are very much aligned too.”
The scheme is being funded through the council’s successful bid to UK Government’s Housing Infrastructure Fund (HIF), administered by Homes England, for £249m. New housing and employment sites are proposed for development close to M5 Junction 10, including the West and North-West Cheltenham developments.
To unlock these housing and job opportunities, the county council said it needs to ensure that there is sufficient highway capacity to accommodate the increased motorised and non-motorised traffic these will generate. An all-movements junction has been identified as a key infrastructure requirement needed to enable the housing and economic development proposed by the Gloucestershire Local Enterprise Partnership’s Strategic Economic Plan and is described as central to the transport network sought by the council in its adopted Gloucestershire Local Transport Plan.
The scheme will be funded through the council’s successful bid to the UK Government’s Housing Infrastructure Fund (HIF), administered by Homes England, for £249m for the M5 Junction 10 Improvements Scheme. In addition, National Highways has also identified that significant growth planned for this area would require improvements to M5 Junction 10 to maintain the safe and efficient operation of the M5 corridor.
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