Monitoring equipment that will ultimately decide whether Ventnor’s Leeson Road can re-open in the future is still yet to be installed – but it may all be in vain as cracks are starting to appear in the road. It was almost a month ago that a packed-out public meeting heard that Island Roads would be installing monitoring equipment 100m into the ground to enable remote monitoring and the facility for automatic road closure. This caused uproar in the room as residents had been led to believe monitoring had been taking place since the landslide on 10th December last year. Now, almost 4 months after that devasting movement of 40 acres of land at Bonchurch, it has been confirmed that specialist and extensive monitoring equipment has still not been installed, although there is evidence of some kind of surface monitoring equipment in place. This means that the realistic chance of Leeson Road opening anytime soon – such as before the Summer season – has been further diminished. It has been decided that the main road between Shanklin and Ventnor cannot re-open until the geological behaviour of deep layers in the area is understood, but it is still too wet to establish boreholes to collect samples. This suggests that the initial investigation work will continue for months to come. 
Island Echo understands there are concerns about further movement occurring imminently, with evidence that the area remains unstable. Cracks have also – apparently – started to appear on Leeson Road itself, with confirmation that ‘vertical movements’ have been discovered. This isn’t obvious from Leeson Road though. Although the monitoring equipment, which will be installed by specialist survey company Socotec, is not yet in place, visual monitoring of the area has been taking place. Permission is still being sought from property owners, including the National Trust and Natural England, to put the wider monitoring equipment in place. 
MONITORING EQUIPMENT STILL NOT IN PLACE BUT ‘VERTICAL MOVEMENTS’ RECORDED AT LEESON ROAD
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I really hope that all residents in the immediate vicinity take note, and that no-one else calls for it to be opened for walkers. Crying shame but safety first.
Is that me again, keep forgetting what I call myself
Schizophrenia?
Is that what you, we, I have ?
How honest of you. I mean us
What a horrible person you are. I bet people go out of their way to avoid you. So clearly far left and hating anyone indigenous and wealthy, pretending to be oh so caring, but so up yourself and can’t wait to insult those who rightly disagree with your leftist bile.
That’s an intelligent reply to a comment about a landslide is it? And I’ve told you before, I don’t hate anyone. I leave uncontrollable emotional knee-jerk reactions to people like you. I’m measured, considerate and have deep respect from the thousands who know and interact with me. Except here, and the few with wilful ignorance and cognitive dissonance, who cannot and will not learn the difference between fact, opinion, belief and prejudice. Those things are absolutely nothing to do with politics, left leaning or otherwise.
“fact, opinion, belief and prejudice” have absolutely everything to do with politics to varying degrees. Go easy on the facts though, which are definitely not a vote winner. As the London taxi driver once said: “you can prove anything with facts”.
Ventnor is sadly finished
No it isn’t. Why is it finished? Can you elaborate some more, a road is closed, does that mean that Ventnor is “finished”
Unfortunately if Ocean View Road closes it will be almost impossible for anything other than a car to enter or leave the town if Gills Cliff, ZigZag closed. 4mths and nothing other than an occasional IR guy walking along. I bet alot of people are walking and cycling it ,putting themselves at risk but also taking responsibility for own actions, let’s see video of said cracks !. Residents need to stop paying council tax and use it to fund proper inspection/alternatives?. More than 2500 homes x £100 =£250,000 or £1000 =£2.5million plus business….
There are large cracks developing on the Steephill Down Road behind the Ocean View chip shop, which I assume is the top of the geological feature called the graben. That area by the chip shop is clearly a big concern.
The IoW council website provides access to a technical report from 1991 on “Ground movement in Ventnor, Isle of Wight Undercliff (1991)”. It gives details of the history of land movements in Ventnor for over 200 years, including property damage. Part of the graben area was moving 84 mm per year at one time!
The report states that assessments of landslip risk are based on rainfall in the preceding 4 months. The risk of land slipping is considered very high when the 4-month antecedent effective rainfall (cumulative total rainfall minus evapotranspiration, which is low in the winter) exceeds 350 mm. We’ve had over 540 mm of rain in the past 4 months, which is truly exceptional, so the risk of further movement is still very high.
Many living in Ventnor have never paid full Council tax, as full of single parents, alleged sick, and plenty of drug dependant along with a similar number of alcohol dependent who never work.
So whilst many do pay, many don’t.
Problem is going to be when insurance companies refuse to insure property with those post codes, and then Mortgage lenders will refuse point blank to provide mortgages for people as the risk is never worth it..
So house prices will plummet faster than they are collapsing as it will be cash buyers only, who, IF they risk buying, could, without insurance backing loose ALL their money and homes.
So not finished but in deep decline and property prices are doomed now.
Shame as a pretty place.
Bye bye Ventnor – dump
It’s clear that neither IWCC nor IR have the expertise or funding to deal with this and they know it.
Because this is a major trunk road they have a legal obligation to refer this upwards to the relevant ministry requesting immediate urgent support.
Failure to do so could be regarded as criminal negligence.
The blue slipper clay and underlying geology is not and excuse to abandon the road or just wait to see what happens. It is the reason why urgent action should have been taken 4 months ago to put this in properly qualified hands.
What are you waiting for local councillors? IWCC have made it quite plain that they intend to do nothing, just like they did before.
So push the matter upwards yourselves and do it NOW!
Criminal negligence would be opening the road without ensuring it’s not about to plummet into the sea.
What a shambles over three months has past and basically nothing has been done.
Its absolutely disgusting that there has been no sense of urgency to get this monitoring equipment here or to get a reply from the National Trust or Nature England. As an Island we survive predominantly on tourism and Ventnor/Bonchurch/St Lawrence and the surrounding areas are part of that whether you like Ventnor or not….If Leeson cannot be opened yet/or if ever the contingency should at least to get the surrounding routes in a fit state particularly Lower Gills Cliff and the traffic lights and also the Gaben. However we should be petitioning Government for the funding to get one of our main Arterial routes fixed along the entire length. They can spend £83 million resurfacing a motorway!!!!
I completely agree with you Rocky
Would be different if Mssrs Jordan or Bacon were living there….
Just walked the road – pleased to say that the reported cracks don’t seem to be there – @Island Echo where did you get this information from?
Looking at the state of the Graben I would rather take my chances with Leeson road.
I swear blind that people don’t bother reading these reports, they just see Leeson Road and react. It is fairly clear to most people what course of action is being taken and the reasoning behind it (as detailed in the above report) . Just because it does not fit the time scale or convivence of the whingers of Ventnor, does not mean the council are not doing anything. It is becoming a source of mystery just exactly what people expect apart from opening the road at the peril of all, perhaps the council should install a podium in the centre of Ventnor and give hourly announcements or maybe the council should install sky hooks to hold the road up, just in case it tries to thrown itself off the cliff. Be patient!
It doesn’t take four months to get permission to install monitoring equipment. So far I have heard of one meeting that the council were present at and the information they provided was nothing… I found out that Leeson was going to be closed until the end of May on the IR works website. They didn’t give that information out at the meeting…People are impatient due to the lack of information being shared. Do you live along that road? I am a believer that it needs to stay closed until/if its safe but it doesn’t take much to provide more frequent updates…
As not allowed there I haven’t seen the damage, but is it not feasible to use wide, shallow Gabion cages to cover the damaged area, and then use high steel tensile ropes anchored into firm ground to support such, then IF and it is an IF, the road moves at least safety is provided for cars
We can make them to any size
No it is not feasible. You are writing nonsense. If the land under the road slips, then any cars on the road would tumble down the slope. Look at the picture. Massive amounts of land slipped down the slope in December and I would not want to be in a car there if that happened to the road. Your gabion cages would just add the problem because there is no firm ground. That is the cause of the problem.
You can’t trust IWC,they don’t have a clue or any common sense, please tell me you don’t believe, it’s like agreeing with Putin attacking Ukraine or Israel forcing millions to die in Gaza !. Only onek I trust is me!. Ventnor resident’s and businesses need to be taking on IWC, totally disgusting that roads are closed all around Ventnor and only one left – what’s the back up plan now, not wait for when.
As someone said Ventnor will go down the cliff at some point, whats the point in spending millions trying to stop something that you cannot control , now is the time to start rehousing those at most risk before the inevitable happens, start looking at new road links before these roads go downhill, don’t stick your heads in the sand