Heads of the Valleys: The A465 that’s had roadworks for 23 years

Tony Blair was just halfway through his time as prime minister and FA Cup finals were being played in Cardiff when one of the UK’s most expensive and complex road upgrade projects this century began.

But after 23 years, roadworks on the A465 Heads of the Valleys road in south Wales are finally going.

The 28-mile (45km) £2bn upgrade to almost motorway standard was designed to bring prosperity to one of the UK’s most deprived areas.

But some of those living there have called it the “road from hell”.

Work to make the road that links Swansea to Monmouthshire a full dual carriageway began back in 2002.

This was 12 years after Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative UK government drew up an upgrade programme in 1990.

Parts were already two lanes each way, but there was severe congestion and frequent serious road crashes on other parts of the route.

Almost 35 years later after enormous overspends, major delays, devolution, a global pandemic, unsuitable ground for road building and hundreds of carriageway closures, the end is finally in sight.

“It’s like the road from hell,” said one man from affected Merthyr Tydfil. “Not even Chris Rea would dare come here.”

The road crosses the south Wales coalfields, a national park and twists mightily close to people’s homes.

The work was split into six sections, done from the most to least dangerous for drivers.

Almost 70 structures – including more than 40 new bridges and a dozen new junctions – have been built.

Workers have planted 285,000 trees to mitigate its significant environmental impact – offsetting more than seven million kilograms of CO2 a year – in a country that declared a climate emergency six years ago.

Creatures, including bats, dormice and great crested newts, have also been moved.

“The part of Wales we’re in is home to some nationally and European protected valuable species and habitats,” said chartered environmentalist Tim Wroblewski.

Engineers have also built almost nine miles (14km) of routes for walkers and cyclists in the latest section – shifting almost 2,200 Olympic-sized swimming pools’ worth of earth.

Welsh ministers, who took on the building of the project after devolution in 1999, insist the improvement will help communities “left behind after the mines closed” in the 1980s and early 1990.

“In 50 years’ time, experts will look back and say the single biggest thing the Welsh government has done to raise the prospects of Heads of the Valleys communities is building this road,” said Wales’ transport minister Ken Skates.

The A465 was part of a World War Two prosperity project to connect the south Wales’ steel industry with the UK’s old car manufacturing hub of the Midlands.

While the M5 and M50 were built as fast roads, the valleys were a tougher challenge.

Improvements were needed due to poor visibility leading to serious crashes on what was predominantly a three-lane road with few safe overtaking places.

Now drivers can mostly do 70mph without having to stop for roundabouts, which is hoped will make it easier for local people to get around and create a resilient alternative route between the Midlands and south-west Wales, easing pressure on the often congested M4 at Newport.

“This isn’t just about moving people and goods around,” added Skates.

“This is about generating jobs, prosperity, opportunities and better connecting and benefiting communities across the region.”

The construction cost given for the entire project is more than £1.3bn.

The headline price tag for the last two sections currently under construction is £590m. But the figure for the final two stages is also actually £1.4bn – more than £250m than initially revealed – because of the way the project is funded and the Welsh government has not yet paid a penny.

Explaining why costs to pay for the final stage have risen, the government said it had to pay non-recoverable VAT after “detailed discussions with HMRC”.

It is being financed using something called the Mutual Investment Model (MIM) – which is a bit like getting a car on finance.

But in this case the Welsh government will pay about £40m a year for 30 years and get an 11-mile stretch of road that will be maintained by the private firm until it is brought back into public ownership in 2055.

Plaid Cymru has said this way of funding was a “waste of public money” and private firms would “cream off” a “substantial amount of profit”.

The UK left the European Union during the scheme, meaning access to money that had helped on previous sections was no longer available.

The Welsh government said without borrowing cash the way it has, it would not have been able to finish the final section.

Skates said trying to build something of a similar magnitude in future would be difficult.

The previous five-mile (8km) section also caused controversy too, opening three years late and costing £336m – £133m more than initially agreed.

It came after a dispute about how much building work was needed and construction completion on the delicate site through the protected steep Clydach Gorge site, which includes hidden caves and geological hazardous terrain.

“As a whole, the Heads of the Valleys project is one of the UK’s biggest road upgrade projects for many years,” said Keith Jones of the Institution of Civil Engineers.

“And what’s been so challenging is keeping the existing road operational while the work has gone on in some challenging and bleak terrain.”

These factors combined mean the entire cost will be about £2bn when everything is included.

The Labour Welsh government said it had learned lessons from the project, changing construction contracts and reviewing indicators of contractor performance.

But Welsh Conservative transport spokesman Peter Fox said the projects cost and delays “epitomises Labour’s 25 years of failure here in Wales”.

He said the final “gargantuan” cost would have almost covered the scrapped M4 relief road, and the Welsh public would question if it was worth it.

The £1.6bn M4 relief road south of Newport’s Brynglas Tunnels congestion hotspot was axed in 2019 – 29 years after it was first proposed – because of its cost and impact on the environment.

Almost four times as many cars a day use that stretch of motorway than the Heads of the Valleys road.

“We don’t want to invest in those areas that are already successful and where there’s already opportunity and plenty of jobs,” added Skates.

But those in the communities near the long-running roadworks have been affected the most.

“It’s been a nightmare,” said Tanya Houghton, from Merthyr Tydfil.

“It’s been terrible as my partner has been working in that direction so getting to and from work has been a nightmare, I’ll be glad when it’s finished and I think it’ll be worth it.”

Her sister Kayleigh did not agree, saying it was not needed and “cost too much money”.

One trader in the town centre claimed trade had dropped 50% due to the roadworks.

“It puts people off coming to town as they’re in the queues for so long, it’s blinking terrible and it has really affected us,” said Paula Owen, who has run Paula’s Boutique in St Tydfil Shopping Centre for more than six years.

“With impact of Covid, the cost of living crisis and this, it’s been hard.”

She said the works had affected trade for a “long time” but the road would “make a big difference when its finished”.

All major road building projects in Wales, as well as the M4 relief road, were scrapped under Mark Drakeford’s administration, but the current transport minister said there was a “careful balance” to be struck.

“You’ve got to drive down carbon emissions but also drive prosperity and improve people’s lives by investing in skills and infrastructure,” said Skates.

Politicians also point to a legacy of 250 engineering apprentices that have been trained on this scheme as well as the 5,000 workers that have been employed at various points during the project, with some days 1,000 contractors working on site at any one time.

Two businesses at each end of the project said they had doubled their number of employees.

“The project has enabled us to upscale in both employees and equipment,” said Tony Gibbons, whose firm Atlas are looking after the drainage of this project.

“We are employing 60 plus people from the local community and it has been transformative for us.

“It’s also helped us successfully tender for other projects as people are confident they can rely on our work because of what we have been able to do on this scheme.”