The article describes proposals for removing heavy vehicles from Petworth, a market town in West Sussex. Over the years it has not proved possible to do this by building a bypass. The simplest approach might be to apply bans where vehicles leave the County's Strategic Road Network to travel towards Petworth. It is shown that this ban would affect only 9 per cent of through goods vehicles. The majority of vehicles passing through the town require access to the cell defined by the Strategic Road Network. A local ban depends on creating an alternative network for diverted goods vehicles. The article describes how this can be done much more cheaply than building a bypass for all traffic. As the diversion route would be longer than going through Petworth for most goods vehicles, a mandatory scheme with enforcement is needed. The proposed scheme would allow access by only one of the available routes; on other routes a total ban can be applied. This can be enforced by cameras. Exit from the town is allowed by any route, thus avoiding complications in the narrow streets of the town centre. The project described has progressed in stages. The initial study, which is described in detail, was able to demonstrate that a solution was feasible at moderate cost. This work has been superseded by further work which has both updated the original proposals and carried the development of a solution forward. The full process is described, to illustrate both how the initial solution was developed and subsequently how it proved possible to progress a more modest scheme, once further information was obtained.
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