CAMPAIGNERS living along the A12 in Suffolk have branded a £5 million proposed revamp of the road a "waste of money" – after it snubbed their bid for bypasses.

CAMPAIGNERS living along the A12 in Suffolk have branded a £5 million proposed revamp of the road a "waste of money" – after it snubbed their bid for bypasses.

The draft Route Management Strategy sets out a 10-year shopping list of "highly visible" schemes with short-term benefits such as traffic calming, pedestrian, cycle and safety measures for the A12 from Ipswich to Lowestoft.

There is a provision for park and ride at Martlesham and a new travel centre for Saxmundham but bypasses are not on the list.

Years of campaigning by villagers to divert traffic away from Farnham, Stratford St Andrew, Marlesford and Little Glemham, appear to have come to nothing.

A spokesman for Marlesford Parish Council, one of the strategy's consultees, said: "The money is being wasted on a lot of minor schemes when it could be better spent doing the job properly in the first place."

Suffolk County Council took over responsibility for the A12 North from the Government after the route was detrunked in June last year.