Drone footage reveals the enormous scale of a road construction project in Gloucestershire.
The three-and-a-half-year project is about to enter its main phase, which involves building a 3.4-mile bypass to address the A417 “missing link” near Birdlip.
Land clearing and site preparation have been underway since last autumn. The crucial stage of constructing the road from the Air Balloon to Cowley roundabouts is set to start in April, reports Gloucestershire Live.
So far, the project has involved demolishing the Air Balloon pub and building a temporary mini-roundabout at the top of Leckhampton Hill at the junction with the A436. Trees and shrubs have also been removed from the Crickley Hill section of the A417 to make way for road widening.
The drone footage featured in this article was captured by Jason Scriven and shared with Gloucestershire Live. The footage was filmed on Monday, February 19.
The sweeping footage shows the drone heading north on the A417 towards the Cowley roundabout, with a vast area cleared in preparation for the road construction to begin in earnest soon.
It provides a bird’s eye view of the work that is difficult to appreciate from a driver’s perspective.
The footage also shows the site where the Air Balloon pub once stood. Now levelled, diggers can be seen working at the site behind the fencing.
A new mini-roundabout at the junction of Leckhampton Hill and the A436 is causing a stir for making traffic slower on the main road towards the Air Balloon roundabout.
You can see where they’ve been working and cleared land by the A436. This means there will be some road closures around there.
Mr Scriven, who took the video, said: “I decided to film the construction site because just driving past didn’t give a true sense of its size. Using a drone really puts things into perspective. This project is huge.
“And it turns out, I had the wrong idea about where it was going. With this footage, myself and viewers can see both the scale of the construction and its planned route in real-time.”
He added: “I think this new road is a great idea. The collisions and traffic jams on that road have been a real hassle.”
“When I used to work in vehicle recovery, it was always a challenge dealing with the vehicle collisions and breakdowns there. But with this new road, I’m hopeful for smoother traffic and safer driving conditions.”
The video from up high shows how much has been cleared on the steep part of the A417, Crickley Hill. The work will make the hill less steep and turn it into a big road with two lanes each way. There will also be an extra slow lane for big trucks climbing up from the A46 Brockworth/Shurdington junction.
The work is expected to be completed by Spring 2027.
