First crash on new bypass (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

First crash on new bypass

8 DEAD IN 12 DAYS: SEVERAL accidents have hit west Wiltshire's newest stretch of road within just one week of it opening.

The Semington bypass saw its first major accident on Thursday morning, just six days after it opened to traffic on March 26.

A 47-year-old man and his 21-year-old son were taken to the Royal United Hospital in Bath after their Volvo car was in a collision with a Toyota van driven by a contractor working on the new road.

The father suffered chest injuries and the son head and face injuries. The accident happened at 10am and the road was closed for more than three hours.

A police spokesman said: "We cannot comment on the cause of the accident at the moment."

Also within days of the opening a deer and a badger were hit and killed along the road, despite costly safety measures, including £100,000 badger tunnels, designed to protect both wildlife and drivers.

Malcolm Clark from the Wildlife Consultancy said Wiltshire County Council should have made sure safety measures were in place before the road was opened.

He said: "The wildlife mitigation is a requirement laid down by English Nature.

"The Council has failed dismally to provide this. These issues need resolving urgently, not only for the wildlife but to prevent a serious accident or fatality."

Mr Clark walked along the bypass on Monday to look at the measures put in place.

He said badgers would need a ladder and a boat to use one of the tunnels provided.

A statement from Wiltshire County Council said: "We take our responsibility towards the environment very seriously and the bypass includes a series of measures to help protect badgers, newts and other wildlife.

"We believed all the necessary protection measures had been completed. Sadly, site staff alerted us to a problem on Monday when a dead badger was found."

The council is in the process of sealing a number of holes and modifying one of the tunnels.

The £12m, 4km stretch of road is expected to carry about 18,000 vehicles a day and marks the end of a 40-year wait for Semington villagers.