The Hogarth Roundabout is a major roundabout situated in Chiswick in west London. It connects the A4 Great West Road and the A316 Great Chertsey Road, two of the nine main radial roads to or from the city. [a] The final section of the A316 is Dorchester Grove (which becomes Chiswick Lane) to the north; the local road Church Street leads south to the conserved and affluent Old Chiswick riverside area.
The centre part of the roundabout is surfaced with grass and trees, and is crossed by a one-way flyover for eastbound traffic.
The roundabout is named after the eighteenth-century painter William Hogarth whose home Hogarth's House is behind a long high wall to the west of the junction. [3] The eastern approach abuts the Griffin Brewery of Fuller, Smith and Turner where beer has been brewed since 1654. [4] The south side has the 18th-century George and Devonshire pub. [5] Another pub by the roundabout, the Mawson Arms on Chiswick Lane, was sold along with the brewery to Asahi in 2019. [6]
The junction is important for road transport as it lies on the only direct route to Heathrow Airport from the City and the West End.
The junction is noteworthy for the single-lane flyover to ease some eastbound traffic from the A316 onto the A4. It was built as a temporary measure in 1971, using the Bridgway format devised and offered to highway authorities by Marples Ridgeway Ltd. [7]
The flyover was quickly put together with a cheap steel frame and was designed to last no more than a few years. The central span has pairs of diagonal cross-braces to give the structure strength and help protect it against strong winds. The junction was included in the plans for the London Ringways, which were shelved in the latter years of the 20th century. [8] Had these been completed a more durable structure would have been put in place.
On 29 October 2013, after stormy winds the previous day, Transport for London inspectors discovered defects and closed the flyover, declaring it unsafe. Garrett Emmerson stated that its engineers identified a degradation in the concrete deck of the flyover. Traffic flow was therefore reduced, with peak time queues back to the Hammersmith flyover to the east and similarly to the west. [9]
Following on from this closure a major refurbishment, incorporating a new deck, surface and parapets, allowed the flyover to reopen and confirmed its permanent status. [10] The work was completed in September 2014, at a total cost of £3 million. [11]
As of April 2024 vehicles using the flyover are limited to 2.0 metres (6.6 ft) width and 3.0 metric tons (3.0 long tons; 3.3 short tons) gross weight.
Chiswick is a district in the London Borough of Hounslow, West London, England. It contains Hogarth's House, the former residence of the 18th-century English artist William Hogarth; Chiswick House, a neo-Palladian villa regarded as one of the finest in England; and Fuller's Brewery, London's largest and oldest brewery. In a meander of the River Thames used for competitive and recreational rowing, with several rowing clubs on the river bank, the finishing post for the Boat Race is just downstream of Chiswick Bridge.
The M4, originally the London-South Wales Motorway, is a motorway in the United Kingdom running from west London to southwest Wales. The English section to the Severn Bridge was constructed between 1961 and 1971; the Welsh element was largely complete by 1980, though a non-motorway section around Briton Ferry bridge remained until 1993. On the opening of the Second Severn Crossing in 1996, the M4 was rerouted over it.
The Westway is a 2.5-mile (4 km) elevated dual carriageway section of the A40 trunk road in West London running from Paddington in the east to North Kensington in the west. It connects the London Inner Ring Road to the West London suburbs.
The M2 is a 26-mile-long (42 km) long motorway in Kent, England, and was built to bypass a section of the A2 road in Kent, which goes through the Medway Towns, Sittingbourne, and Faversham. It provides an alternative route to the Port of Dover, which supplements the M20 motorway located further to the south. The terminal junctions of the M2 intersect with the A2, which come together to form a 62-mile-long (100 km) long trunk road from London to Dover.
The A4 is a major road in England from Central London to Avonmouth via Heathrow Airport, Reading, Bath and Bristol. It is historically known as the Bath Road with newer sections including the Great West Road and Portway. The road was once the main route from London to Bath, Bristol and the west of England and formed, after the A40, the second main western artery from London.
The M23 is a motorway in the United Kingdom, running from the south of Hooley in Surrey, where it splits from the A23, to Pease Pottage, south of Crawley in West Sussex where it rejoins the A23. The northern end of the motorway starts on what is effectively a 2-mile (3.2 km) spur north of junction 7 of the M25 motorway. From Hooley it runs for 17 miles (27 km) past Redhill, Gatwick Airport and Crawley. A spur runs from junction 9 to Gatwick Airport.
The North Circular Road is a 25.7-mile-long (41.4 km) ring road around Central London. It runs from Chiswick in the west to Woolwich in the east via suburban North London, connecting various suburbs and other trunk roads in the region.
Cromwell Road is a major London road in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, designated as part of the A4. It was created in the 19th century and is said to be named after Richard Cromwell, son of Oliver Cromwell, who once owned a house there.
Fuller's Brewery in Chiswick, west London, England, is the former brewing division of Fuller, Smith & Turner PLC. It was a family-run business from its foundation in 1845 until 2019, when it was sold to the Japanese international beverage giant Asahi.
Gallows Corner is a major road junction in Romford in Greater London, England. It was the site of the gallows of the Liberty of Havering, hence the name.
The A329(M) is a motorway in Berkshire, England. It is 4 miles (6.4 km) long and runs from the west of Bracknell to the north west of Winnersh. It is one of a small number of parts of the motorway system in England that are managed by the local highway authority, in this case Wokingham Borough Council, rather than National Highways.
The A316, known in parts as the Great Chertsey Road, is a major road in England, which runs from the A315 Chiswick High Road, Turnham Green, Chiswick to join head-on the M3 motorway at Sunbury-on-Thames. Its initial London section Chiswick Lane heads south – following this it is a mostly straight dual carriageway aligned WSW.
The West Cross Route (WCR) is a 0.75-mile-long (1.21 km) segment of dual carriageway of the A3220 route in West London running north–south between the northern elevated roundabout junction with the western end of Westway (A40) and the southern Holland Park Roundabout. It runs through Shepherd's Bush to its west and Notting Hill to its east.
East Cross Route (ECR) is a dual-carriageway road constructed in east London as part of the uncompleted Ringway 1 as part of the London Ringways plan drawn up the 1960s to create a series of high speed roads circling and radiating out from central London. The road was constructed between 1967 and 1973 and runs from Hackney Wick in north-east London, through the Blackwall Tunnel, to Kidbrooke in south-east London. The ECR was initially designated as part of the A102, but has, subsequently, been partially renumbered so that sections of it are now the A2 and A12.
The A3220 is a primary A road in London, England. It runs north from Clapham Common to the A40 Westway at Ladbroke Grove.
The A40 is a major trunk road connecting London to Fishguard, Wales. The A40 in London starts in the City of London and passes through six London Boroughs: Camden, Westminster, Kensington & Chelsea, Hammersmith & Fulham, Ealing and Hillingdon, to meet the M40 motorway junction 1 at Denham, Buckinghamshire.
The Chiswick flyover is a short elevated section of the M4 motorway in the western approaches to London, United Kingdom. The flyover in the west London suburb of Chiswick, was opened in 1959 with the intention of reducing congestion and the impact on local traffic of vehicles travelling around London on the North and South Circular Roads and between London and the west on the Great West Road. Although it was not originally built as a motorway, it was later incorporated into the M4 motorway.
Chiswick Roundabout is a major roundabout with a flyover in Chiswick, West London. It was opened in 1959 and is the meeting point of three roads that terminate here, the A205 South Circular, A315 Chiswick High Road, A406 North Circular; and one road which carries on through and interfaces with the M4 – the A4 Great West Road – therefore, it is extremely busy in daytime.
Old Chiswick is the area of the original village beside the river Thames for which the modern district of Chiswick is named. The village grew up around St Nicholas Church, founded c. 1181 and named for the patron saint of fishermen. The placename was first recorded c. 1000 as Ceswican. In the Middle Ages the villagers lived by fishing, boatbuilding, and handling river traffic. The surrounding area was rural until the late 19th century.
Chiswick High Road is the principal shopping and dining street of Chiswick, a district in the west of London. It was part of the main Roman road running west out of London, and remained the main road until the 1950s when the A4 was built across Chiswick. By the 19th century the road through the village of Turnham Green had grand houses beside it. The road developed into a shopping centre when Chiswick became built up with new streets and housing to the north of Old Chiswick, late in the 19th century. There are several listed buildings including public houses, churches, and a former power station, built to supply electricity to the tram network.