Star comment: Hurry up and ease our roads

Add up all those who will be just passing through Shropshire at the peak summer holiday times and you will build a compelling case for major investment in the county's road network.

Shropshire is the gateway to Mid Wales and the Welsh coast. And with the end of term approaching, the big getaway is almost upon us.

Transport minister Jesse Norman has named a 12-mile stretch of the A458 in England as being worst hit by the seasonal upsurge of traffic at this time of the year, based on the experience of last year when 23 per cent more vehicles used the road during the six-week period from July 25, compared with the same length of time from September 12.

The A458? It will take you from Bridgnorth to Shrewsbury, by way of Much Wenlock and Cressage, and then it funnels the holiday traffic west of the county town through Halfway House and towards Welshpool.

Gone are the days when the main route for holidaymakers was the old A5 right through the middle of what is today Telford, leading to nose-to-tail jams.

The advent of the M54 and A5 dual carriageway have meant, incidents and road works excepted, that you can generally hope for plain sailing until you reach the environs of Shrewsbury, when the traffic lights and traffic islands start to bite.

Borth, Barmouth, Aberdyfi - the A458 is the route for you. Dual carriageway shrinks to a single carriageway. Increase the volume of traffic substantially, and throw caravans into the mix - this is nothing against caravans, but being longer, they are less easy to pass - and you have the potential for a frustrating start to your holiday.

If you are going on holiday, that is. If not, and you are local traffic, you have all the frustration without even having the thought of a holiday at the end of it to look forward to.

The road network in Shropshire and the borders area has been a source of concern for some time. The extra pressures brought by the summer holiday period are temporary, but they also do point to what things are going to be like routinely in the future because of the general increase in vehicles on the roads.

Rather than having the system grind to a halt, would it not be a good idea to start making the changes that are needed now, taking the summer getaway as a dry run for what we shall have to cope with day in, day out?