Southport New Road, Banks to Holmes, A565

OS 1937-61

Modern Map

View this cycle track's location on the big map.

Date opened/built:

c1939/1940.

Length:

2.92 miles (4.7kms).

Width:

9-ft (2.74m).

Adjoining footway:

Yes.

Road type:

Rural dual carriageway.

Surface:

Modern asphalt.

Both sides of road:

Yes.

Adjacent to social housing:

No.

Start:

https://goo.gl/maps/cLJWhiwAaTL14qfAA

End:

https://goo.gl/maps/o5grt77jqeHLRcif7

Period mapping:

OS 1:10,000 surveyed/revised pre-1930 to 1955, published 1955 https://maps.nls.uk/view/189179430 OS Six inch, revised 1938, published 1950 https://maps.nls.uk/view/101102390 Both maps show road sterilisation, but no markings for road or cycle tracks or footway.

OpenCycleMap status:

https://www.opencyclemap.org/?zoom=15&lat=53.6648&lon=-2.89114&layers=B0000 Cycleways marked on both sides of road, no footways marked

Sources:

Period maps, newspaper reports, MoT archives.

Cycle track on Southport Road. Credit: Raymond Knapman/Wikipedia

The bypass of Banks, Mere Brow and Holmes was probably built between 1937 and 1939 with one newspaper saying work was being carried out in 1937. And reports in 1936 said the New Southport Road would feature “dual carriage ways and cycle tracks.”

“Surfacing [on A565], not yet settled but will probably be a sand-bitumen carpet, 9ft wide,” said an MoT letter to the American Embassy in London in March 1937.

“The western half of the Southport-Preston road … when reconstructed will be 120 feet, and the proposed layout consists of dual 22-foot carriageways, separated by a central reservation of the same width, two 9-foot cycle tracks, protected from vehicular traffic by margins 6 feet wide and two 6-foot footpaths,” reported the Liverpool Echo in December 1937.

“The first part of the Lancashire County Council’s scheme for the removal of danger points and the provision of cycle tracks and dual carriageways on the western half of the Southport-Preston road will probably commence on Monday,” informed the Lancashire Evening Post on Thursday, 20 January 1938

NOTES

The bypass of Banks, Mere Brow ... Lancashire Evening Post, 6 December 1937.

And reports in 1936 said the ... “GREAT ARTERY FOR TRAFFIC,” Liverpool Echo, 30 January 1936.

“Surfacing [on A565], not yet ... Stats from MoT letter to Mr. Stebbins, Assistant Trade Commissioner, American Embassy, Bush House, WC2, 18 March 1937, MoT archives.

“The western half of the ... Liverpool Echo, 6 December 1937.

Explore the tracks

Links Road, Blyth

Blyth Town Council approved plans for the Links Road and its cycle tracks in October 1936. “The Borough Engineer reported ... that the proposed scheme was to widen the Links Road to make provision for road 120 feet wide with a two-way motor and cycle tracks, grass verges and footpaths, which would cost £31,000, from the north end of the Promenade to Gloucester Lodge,” said a report in the Morpeth Herald of that year. Read more

Neville’s Cross, A167, Durham

“A section of 1,063 yards of the Al road in Durham county, near Farewell Hall, is to be reconstructed with twin carriageways and 9ft. cycle paths,” reported The Cyclist in November 1936. Read more

Wadloes Road & Barnwell Road, Cambridge

Cambridge’s Wadloes Road is residential yet it’s equipped with a period 9-ft cycle track and an adjacent 6-ft footway. Barnwell Road to the immediate south also has a period cycle track and footway. The roads were planned as one and, in the 1930s, were meant to be the southern half of Cam’s Causeway, a proposed eastern bypass of Cambridge. Read more

Melton Road, Thurmaston

Melton Road, Leicester, has a long history: it is built on the same alignment as the Roman Fosse Way and, in the 18th Century, it was improved as part of the Melton Mowbray turnpike. In the 1930s it was widened and straightened. Read more

Stony Stratford to Wolverton

The Stony Stratford to Wolverton cycle track was operational by the summer of 1934, the second to open in the UK following the trial track on Western Avenue in London. It was easy to build because works were already due to be carried out on the Wolverton Road but mainly because it involved the resurfacing of an existing roadside track, the short commuter route of a steam-powered tramway, dismantled eight years earlier. Read more

Woodford Avenue, A1400, Ilford

A series of eight, high-definition black-and-white photographs of the small Trebor sweet factory in Ilford show that, in September 1950, the cycle tracks on Woodford Avenue were made from concrete and the footways were surfaced with asphalt. “Cyclists only” signs can be seen facing the tracks. Slim grass verges abut the road. Read more

Kingston Bypass, A3, London

Remodelling, including widenings and the addition of flyovers, has obliterated whatever, by the 1960s, remained of the original Kingston Bypass, opened by Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin on 30 November 1927. Read more

Bushey Road, Wimbledon, London

“Cycle tracks and a dual highway are part of a £15,000 scheme for the improvement of Bushey Road, near Raynes Park, Surrey,” reported the Western Daily Press in September 1935. Read more

Ellon Road, Bridge of Don, nr. Aberdeen

According to a 1937 newspaper report there was to be a widened road from the Bridge of Don, north of Aberdeen, to Murcar, a distance of two miles. Read more

Longforgan, A90, nr Dundee

The bypass of Longforgan was largely built by 1939, complete with cycle tracks and footways, but finishing work appears to have stopped at the outbreak of war, with the road not completed until 1946 or 1947. Newspaper reports say there were cycle tracks and footways on both sides of the bypass, but there’s only one shared use path in evidence today. Read more