Reading Road will be closed between the crossroads and the M4 motorway bridge by Woodward Close from 8 pm – 6 am every night from the evening of Wednesday 3rd February to the morning of Friday 19th February.
This is so that the road can be resurfaced for the new cycleway.
The diversion will be via King Street Lane, Bearwood Road, Barkham Road and back on to Reading Road via the Station Link Road.
Sainsburys will open as usual. There will be some nights where residents and businesses between the crossroads and Woodward Close will not be able to access their driveways. Those affected should have received a letter from the Borough Council, which includes details of alternative parking for them for those night(s).
As part of the cycleway changes, the bus shelter opposite Sainsburys will be moved further down to reduce the bottleneck caused by buses stopping near the Sainsburys lights.  The old shelter is rotting so needs replacing.  A new one is on order but may not arrive before the resurfacing is finished. Moving the shelter further down the road requires some work to the electricity supply which is done by the utility company.  That also may take a bit longer.  So the bus shelter is likely to be the last bit that is done.

Rachelle and I would like to hear your views on the cycleway itself.
We are not happy at the removal of the central hatching and right turn arrows, which was done as part of the previous phase of cycleway between the Showcase roundabout and the crossroads. This has made it harder for residents to turn into and out of the side roads. The new phase doesn’t really have such hatching, so this is less of a problem.

Some of the pedestrian islands in the middle of the road were also lost in the earlier phase, but we did get two pedestrian crossings instead.  In this new phase, we welcome the fact that the island before the Sainsburys lights (if you are coming from Wokingham) has already been removed, as it got in the way of vehicles fully using both lanes in the run up to the lights.
We complained about the shoddy pavement resurfacing in the earlier phase, and the Council will not be doing similar resurfacing this time.  Instead they have been sorting out the worst stretches of pavement – and doing it properly, which is much better.

But please do send us your views!

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