A1018 road


The A1018 is a road in North East England. It runs between South Shields, at the mouth of the River Tyne, and the A19 near Seaham, County Durham. Most of the route it follows is the old alignment of the A19, before it by-passed Sunderland to meet the Tyne Tunnel.

Route

South Tyneside section

The road begins in the centre of South Shields as Westoe Road. This single carriageway road runs to Westoe Bridges and to the roundabout with Sunderland Road and Imeary Street. The A1018 then continues on Sunderland Road becoming a dual carriageway. The road crosses the A1300 and continues to Ridgeway where it returns to a single carriageway. The A1018 then extends through Cleadon Village, becoming Sunderland Road and runs to the Sunderland border.

Sunderland section

As the A1018 enters City of Sunderland from the north, it is known as Shields Road, which then becomes Newcastle Road. This long straight section passes through the Boldons, Fulwell and Monkwearmouth towards the River Wear.
Newcastle Road ends at a large roundabout. The road runs along Roker Avenue and then Church Street North. At this point, the A1018 merges with the A183 road and become Dame Dorothy Street which crosses the Wearmouth Bridge into the centre of the City of Sunderland.
On the south side of the Wear, the A1018 heads east toward Hendon as West Wear Street and then Sans Street, and then continues through Hendon via West Wear Street, Hendon Road and Commercial Road into Grangetown as the Southern Radial Route. It bypasses Ryhope to meet Stockton Road at the Wellfield Roundabout.

Sunderland Southern Radial Route

The Southern Radial Route provides a fast and direct route from the south of Ryhope Village towards Sunderland City Centre.
The former route of the A1018, Ryhope Road, was renumbered to the B1522 and will be converted to a No Car Lane between Grangetown and Park Lane Interchange. On Ryhope Road, two of the current four lanes of road will be used for cars, and the other two for mixed traffic excluding cars.

Safety of the A19

The number of accidents on the A19 rose from 274 in 2011 to 319 in 2015, causing Easington MP Grahame Morris to call for an inquiry into the safety of the A19. In August 2017, the Hartlepool Mail, backed by Hartlepool MP Mike Hill, began a campaign to press the Department of Transport on this issue.