Bucklesham Road in east Ipswich will be closed for eight weeks from September 3 as the remodelling of the Felixstowe Road area of the town continues.

The road will be shut until October 27 to enable engineers to rebuild the St Augustine’s Roundabout – although if the work goes better than planned, it could re-open earlier.

Bus stops along Bucklesham Road will be suspended with buses using Felixstowe Road and Straight Road during the closure.

The work to widen Felixstowe Road and improve traffic flows in this part of town started in June and is due to be completed by November 17.

Once work on the Bucklesham Road roundabout is complete there will be some final resurfacing to be done, but this will be done mainly at night and without closing any roads during the day.

Homes in the area have been sent letters by Suffolk Highways outlining the proposed road changes – and there was a detailed exhibition outlining the proposed work at St Augustine’s Church in May before the engineers moved into the area.

The work is part of a major redesign of the roads in the east of Ipswich and will link in to already-improved road network between the A14 at Nacton and Warren Heath.

It is hoped that this will allow traffic to get towards Ipswich town centre from the east easier in the future.

As well as making life easier for motorists, the new roads are also planned to improve safety for pedestrians and cyclists with the creation of a new footway/cycle path.

During the work at the roundabout there will also be temporary traffic lights to control the traffic which will be manually controlled during the day to try to ensure that disruption is kept to a minimum.

The entire remodelling work should be completed by the time the Christmas shopping season starts in earnest – enabling people to reach Ipswich town centre.

However it has not been without its critics – at the public information sessions at St Augustine’s church in May many residents expressed concern about the plans and feared they would merely speed traffic towards the town centre but that it would eventually be caught in congestion nearer the heart of Ipswich.