Stretch of busy Milton Keynes grid road to be closed for SEVEN months as new roundabout is built

The new four-armed roundabout will be on the H9 Groveway, at the junction of Walton Drive, and work will start on May 3.

A stretch of H9 will be closed until December and a diversion route will be in place.

The new roundabout will serve the planned housing development of Walton Manor, where there will be 174 new homes built on a 9.5-hectare site, which sits between Brickhill Street and Simpson.

The roundabout will take 33 weeks to construct and will ultimately help help traffic flow and reduce congestion from the new development.

Milton Keynes Development Partnership (MKDP) owns the Walton Manor site and has commissioned MK Council to design and implement the roundabout.

The work will be done in two phases due to the scale, complexity and amount of work taking place. This will include the diversion of six major power supply cables by Western Power Distribution, which is being coordinated into the scheme.

A main gas pipe is also located underground so for safety reasons, no mechanical diggers may be used, and the area around it must be completely hand dug instead which will take longer.

Phase 1 was carried out in February, clearing vegetation and any tree stumps. Phase 2, the main construction part of the scheme, will include installing the new roundabout with signage, road markings, traffic islands, upgrading the existing street lighting and drainage, and resurfacing sections of the existing H9 Groveway approaching the new roundabout.

MK Council says the road closure is necessary to ensure safely during the construction phase. A diversion will be in place to divert traffic to use either the H10 Bletcham Way or H8 Standing Way grid roads. Any bus services will also follow this diversion.

Also, the Open University has agreed to open up their Walton Drive access road during this time.

The Covid-19 Vaccination Centre at the Open University campus will remain open with a diversion access route clearly signed.

All the works will be carried out by MK Council’s highways service provider, Ringway.