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A Little History

Until the 1970s all through east-west traffic trundled along the Cliffe and High Street, with appalling damage to our town’s liveability.   County Highways therefore planned an alternative “Inner Relief Road” which was set to plough through the northern part of the town from the north end of Cuilfail Tunnel to the Prison Crossroads. 

Under pressure from the Friends of Lewes and others, this crazy scheme was fortunately aborted.  Such was the joy when the A27 bypass was instead proposed that at the planning stage few challenged its route, hard up against the town’s southern boundary.   A “cut-and-fill” engineer’s solution dumped the chalk excavated from the Jugg’s Road cutting as a 6m high embankment along the southern edge of the town. Back in the 1970’s there was little questioning of a scheme’s environmental or health impacts.  The noise from the elevated bypass is much louder and more widespread than if it had been built at ground level.

Environmental Impacts

Over the years many have complained to the Highways Agency (HA) about the bypass noise, including Lewes MPs Tim Rathbone(1996) and Norman Baker(1997), the Friends of Lewes, several councillors, and large numbers of Lewesians.  In 2003 Cllr Ruth O’Keeffe carried out a survey of all the houses in Priory Ward, and found that an estimated 2000 properties are affected by bypass noise, and that 60% of respondents said they never found the noise to be acceptable.

Go to the Blog for a summary of responses from the HA to residents’ questions about noise. The contradictions make for amusing (and depressing) reading.   They confirm that noise reduction has never been a priority for the HA.

At a recent Zoom meeting the Highways England noise advisor was unwilling to engage with any positive proposals for noise abatement, citing that Lewes was not in a high enough category to merit public spending, and that speed limitation could only be implemented on safety and air pollution grounds. 

Lewes is an outstandingly lovely town, situated in a National Park, with little background noise from other sources such as industry. 

Enjoyment of gardens, public and private, is diminished.   Open-air events in the Grange are heard with a background of traffic, not birdsong, and the Railway Land nature reserve is likewise blighted.  Traffic noise is thought to affect birds’ ability to mate, as they cannot hear each other (they have no windows to shut out the din!).  Noise is worst under certain atmospheric conditions, but particularly when the road surface is wet and the wind is from the prevailing southwest. 

Noise is recognised as a health hazard, leading to increased incidence of strokes, heart attacks and stress.  The WHO have set recommended maximum noise levels, and it is likely that parts of Lewes exceed those levels.  As a result property values are diminished, and there are accounts of house sales falling through because of the noise as far away as Grange Road.   It has been estimated that road noise in urban areas costs £7 to 10 billion per year!

Why we need to take action now

1.  The Environmental Noise Regulations (England) 2006 “aim to promote good health and quality of life through effective management of noise…and control of noise at source should be the first consideration.”
2. The Government last in 2020 announced a £350 mill. fund to reduce the environmental impact of major roads, including trunk roads such as the A27.  Noise barriers have been erected on the A1 and elsewhere.   We need to show that Lewes has a claim to that fund.
3. Were the bypass to be built today its location and design would be unacceptable. We are demanding it be retro-fitted to bring it up to acceptable standards.
4. Since 1990 much of Lewes has been designated as Conservation Areas where the quality of its environment must be maintained or enhanced.  Strides are being made to reduce the impact of traffic within the town, but this leaves the bypass as a major cause of traffic blight.
5. With increasing traffic levels (there are proposals to increase the capacity of the A27 east of Lewes), noise from the road can only get worse.

What can be done

No chance of re-building the road at ground level, but there are several ways that its noise pollution could be reduced:

Acoustic barriers are one of the most effective ways of reducing noise, which is why we are fundraising to commission an Acoustic Study into the effectiveness of different designs of acoustic barrier along the bypass.

Demands in 2004 for quieter surfacing materials were met with the answer that it would be done within a few years, or only when the road was so worn that it became unsafe.  But rather than the resurfacing promised  by about 2010, only small patches have been repaired as and when essential. 

A 10mph reduction of the bypass speed limit from 70mph to 60mph could reduce noise levels, and would increase travel time between the traffic jams at the Ashcombe and Southerham roundabouts by only 13 seconds.  (It would also reduce fuel consumption by 15%, and the severity of any accident).  But the HA have so far dismissed it as unenforceable. History doesn’t relate who planted trees and shrubs on the embankment, which have certainly reduced the visual impact of traffic. But their noise attenuation is sadly limited, especially in winter when their leaves are off.  Many of the trees are reaching the height when they may blow over, and the ash trees are likely to die from Ash Dieback disease.

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