Not reinstating Undercliff Drive, which collapsed nearly 10 years ago, has been ‘the worst thing’ a councillor has seen during his tenure on the Isle of Wight Council.
Undercliff Drive, between Niton and St Lawrence, has been shut since February 2014 after significant landslips saw the road become unstable. Since then, the road has been in limbo, with part being turned into a public foot and cycle path, but facing calls for the Isle of Wight Council to do something with it.
Speaking at a meeting of the Isle of Wight Council’s planning committee last week — where a scheme to stabilise the Military Road was refused — Councillor Matt Price said the situation with Undercliff Drive was crazy and there should have been some solution put in place to save it.
Residents have now asked the Council to make a formal decision about the future of the road, either saving it like Belgrave Road in Ventnor or officially closing it.
A concerned resident said the ongoing closure of the Undercliff to vehicles is impacting people’s lives and it feels unfair and unreasonable to allow the indecision to be prolonged.
An Isle of Wight Council spokesperson said it currently has no definitive plans for the future of Undercliff Drive but is investigating options and their implications for keeping the road or formally closing it. They said this was happening alongside commissioning design works for potential improvements and safety works in Niton, that may be required on the current diversion route.
To save the road, the Isle of Wight Council has to bid for funding from the Department for Transport, as it could not afford to do so otherwise.
The authority has bid in 2 previous rounds of funding and while unsuccessful in 1, it received £2.1 million in 2021 – but that was not enough to cover a scheme which would reinstate the road and was used for other highway safety works instead.
Former ward councillor for St Lawrence, Gary Peace, had campaigned against the reinstatement of the road, previously saying it was inherently unstable and it would continue to collapse. He said the Undercliff is now a paradise walk for cyclists and walkers and should be preserved as just that.
Mr Peace left the authority earlier this week but claimed that 1 of his achievements was the prevention of a vast waste of money being spent on rebuilding the road.
It was the wish of former Council leader, Dave Stewart, to reopen the road and a consultation the Council undertook in 2019 found 58% of people were in favour of reinstating it, but 40% were against, with the remaining voters neutral.
How does it cost tens of millions,
1) Island Roads were responsible and there should be an insurance claim against them .
2) residents (at minimal cost) managed to fill part with rubble etc to allow vehicle access to their own homes which is still there 10yrs later.
3) No reason couldn’t be reinstated for light traffic and one lane like other roads on the Island. Why renew road up to landslip and not be able to use?.
I do get residents not wanting reinstated as peaceful without traffic, I’m sure most of us on main roads would like them closed outside our homes.
The small area and distance which is liable to further movement could easily be filled with Hi grade stainless Gabion Cages, filled with low compression aggregate to easily allow traffic to drive over steel plates with flexible joints ( similar to tank tracks).
It is not as if there is a cliff edge to fall from and so IF any movement occurs sensors could warn of such before danger to any users as this land slips not falls as with military rd
I.v.Searle, Exactly – the Isle of Wight is not unique in having ground movements, yet other countries subject to anticipated ground movements, earthquakes etc, such as New Zealand, do not built fixed hard tarmac roads in such areas. No-one will ever stop the effects of nature in these areas, but you work around them as you suggest. Stabilise with Gabon Cages, fill as you suggest to give a strong unsurfaced Road, subject to a strict 20mm limit. When the ground moves again – which it will – subject to inspect to the level of movement – refill the cracks and carry on.
This is basically what the council did up to the time they poured all that concrete in. All it succeeded in doing was add more weight, adding to the problem. What they needed to do was drain the land proerly which would have brought an end to the movement. They were told this add nauseum but, as they think they know best, they refused to do leading us to where we are now.
Your love affair with gabions would just add a lot more weight to the area, causing even more land movement.
No, the Gabion Cages allow water to flow through them, unlike solid materials, and the weight of the filling of aggregate is pushing down, thus holding back the water logged soil behind them, providing top layer stability yet allowing the water through, hence reducing the sideways thrust to be eased.
Nothing will prevent the deep slipper clay from easing forward, HENCE using Gabion Cages which are cheap, can allow water through, can be made to any size and shape, can be moved by crane if displaced by ground movement and are very ECO friendly if such tripe worries you, and cost effective as can be reused once lifted from any further land movement should they be displaced.
Seems you are enjoying the peace, hence the post.
It dose’nt funny they find the money for floating turd 6..
Who cares if it’s a paradise for walkers and cyclists, it’s oppressing drivers!
Firstly, Matt Price is one of the very few IOW councillors I have any faith in and certainly the only Conservative.
Secondly, nobody mentions the residents of the villages who have been impacted by the detour. The road should have been reinstated years ago.
I can see this farce being replayed on the Military road in a few years.
As the lady who owns both the property and business the other side of this slip, re-opened as a ‘retreat’ for nature lovers, I can confirm birds of prey, red squirrels, badgers, pheasants, walkers, cyclists and visitors are very much enjoying the road closure. Island Roads have already worked hard and closed off the old footpath with new fencing, erected a large No Through road sign and safety reflective barriers to stop cars passing through and have cut back all the Buddliea. Your photos are out of date and do not reflect the recent works. The plastic road block was removed a month ago. I am demolishing buildings at the caravan park to the detriment of potential income, to remove weight off the blue slipper which cannot take the weight.
It’s slap bang in the middle of the largest site of ground movement in Europe. For anyone believing it’s economically viable to reinstate the road, read the geological surveys about the landslip area with reports dating back to Victorian times. The whole area suffers from porous bedrock, and any time there is heavy rain (increasingly frequent nowadays), the bedrock is flooded, therefore undermining the foundations that any road would be rebuilt onto. Conservative estimates of £20M are hopelessly optimistic and don’t account for the likely need to patch and shore up the road every year or two after completion, and probably rebuilding every ten years. Some places just don’t suit having a road, and this is a prime example.
With your negative attitude (or more likely biased as not wanting it reopened for personal reasons) the Victorian engineers would never have built the railways through mountains over swamps and EVERY type of unstable strata over thousands of miles.
Here a child could toss a stone from across the short unstable stretch.
I like it as it is and don’t want it reopened but I don’t see it as needing to be so costly or difficult
Well said Dave, essentially the road has reached the end of it’s life. I would add that if you look on Google Erath you can see that the landslip reaches all the way to the sea, there is no stable land on which to build anything. The road is still ‘open’, (to non motorised traffic) and we should be glad for at least that.
Why would anyone bother rebuilding a road when it will be redundant in a few years after cars are banned in a desperate attempt to save our dying planet.
I am happy to pay extra council tax to bring back this great road.