Ipswich Road at Daniels Road is closed for signal replacement until 25 August 2026. Current Norwich closures, the A47 Thickthorn work and every park and ride.
Two authorities dig up Norwich roads and neither of them is the city council. Norfolk County Council is the highway authority for every street in the city, and National Highways looks after the A47 and the A11. The city council does bins, parking and planning. Knowing which one to check saves a lot of time.
The one closure worth planning around right now is on the ring road.
What is closed in Norwich now
Ipswich Road at Daniels Road is the significant one. Norfolk County Council started replacing the traffic signals at that junction on 21 July 2026 and expects the work to run five weeks, to 25 August 2026. There is a road closure in place for the whole duration with a signed diversion, and the council says the phasing is designed to “maintain adequate ring road vehicle capacity”. The job costs £240,000 and is part of a countywide signal replacement programme.
Two shorter jobs are running through the middle of August as part of the county’s surface dressing season:
- Bethel Street, between St Peters Street and Gaol Hill and on to St Giles Street, was surface dressed on 2 August. The road closes again for lining and road stud replacement on the evenings of 12 and 13 August, 19:00 to midnight. Access to properties is maintained throughout. The whole job costs about £10,800.
- Earlham Green Lane and Bowthorpe Road, between Larkman Lane and Gipsy Lane, were dressed on 1 August, with lining reinstatement on the evening of 13 August, 19:00 to midnight. That one costs about £42,000.
Both are weather dependent, which for surface dressing means they genuinely do move. The county council asks people to read the advance warning signs on site rather than assume the published date holds.
For context on how much of this there is: Norfolk County Council says 351 miles of the county’s roads will get a new seal this year.
The A47 work that will outlast all of it
The A47 Thickthorn junction scheme, where the A47 meets the A11 on the south-west edge of the city, is a National Highways project costing between £216m and £239m. It is building two free-flowing connections between the two roads, with underpasses beneath both carriageways, widening the roundabout from three lanes to four, and adding a new Cantley Lane Link Road out to the B1172 Norwich Road, plus a replacement footbridge.
What that means for drivers through 2026:
- The A47 westbound is down to a single lane until a contraflow switch in October 2026. Eastbound has two lanes through the roundabout.
- The A11 northbound has been reduced to one lane.
- A full closure of the A11 is planned for 18 to 21 September 2026 to install a major bridge.
Main construction started in autumn 2025 and National Highways gives completion as 2028/29. This is the piece of infrastructure that will define journeys in and out of south-west Norwich for the next two summers, and it is worth building into any regular trip toward Cambridge or the A11.
The Norwich Western Link, and where it actually stands
The proposed link between the A47 and Broadland Northway on the west side of the city is often talked about as though it is being built. It is not.
Norfolk County Council withdrew its planning application in January 2025, after it could not resolve an objection from Natural England. The objection concerned barbastelle bats, which are present in the woodland west of Norwich, and it followed new Natural England guidance published days before the application was due to be submitted. The scheme as designed was a 3.9 mile dual carriageway with a viaduct over the River Wensum; the budget at that point was £273.9m.
In July 2025 the council’s cabinet approved options assessment work instead, costing £1.43 million, two thirds of it funded by the Department for Transport. The options being looked at now include improvements to existing roads, public transport and walking and cycling measures as well as new single and dual carriageway routes. The council’s own report says that, on the basis of Natural England’s position, it is “highly unlikely” that a dual carriageway route or a Wensum viaduct as previously proposed would be acceptable.
So the honest summary is that there is no consented Western Link, no start date, and no confirmed route.
Park and ride is the reliable way in
Norwich has six park and ride sites and 4,567 spaces between them. Parking on site is free; you pay only for the bus.
| Site | Address | Spaces | Buses |
|---|---|---|---|
| Costessey | Long Lane, NR9 3LX | 1,100 | Hospital and UEA only, not the city centre |
| Harford | Ipswich Road, NR4 6US | 798 | About every 15 min, Mon to Sat |
| Sprowston | Wroxham Road, NR7 8RN | 788 | About every 15 min, Mon to Sat |
| Thickthorn | Norwich Road, Hethersett, NR9 3AU | 736 | About every 15 min, Mon to Sat |
| Airport | Buck Courtney Crescent, NR6 6JT | 620 | About every 15 min, Mon to Sat |
| Postwick | Yarmouth Road, NR13 5NP | 525 | About every 30 min, Mon to Sat |
Fares are £3 an adult, £2 for 5 to 19 year olds and concessions, £4 for two people and £5 for a group of up to five. Concessionary pass holders pay £2 and can travel at any time. Journeys into the centre take 12 to 20 minutes from any of the five city-centre sites, and Sunday services run at half the weekday frequency, roughly every 30 minutes.
Three things that catch people out:
- Costessey does not go to the city centre. It is the biggest site of the six and its buses serve the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital and the UEA only, Monday to Friday. If you are heading for the market, it is the wrong site.
- Postwick runs at half the frequency of the others, every 30 minutes rather than every 15.
- Overnight parking is not permitted at any site. If you come back after the last bus the entry barrier will be closed, though you can still get your car out.
Sprowston has a café and hosts a car boot sale on Sundays, which makes the site busy but does not stop the buses.
For anything beyond the city, the station car park holds only 70 cars, so park and ride is often the better start to a train journey to London as well. If you are coming in for the day rather than commuting out, what there is to do is mostly within ten minutes’ walk of where the park and ride buses drop you.
Where to check before you set out
- Norfolk County Council’s own closures: the public information notices page lists every closure the county council itself is carrying out, as a dated PDF per job. It does not cover utility companies.
- Everything else, including utilities: the council points to the one.network roadworks map, searchable by road name or area. Most of the short-notice holes in a Norwich street are a water, gas or broadband job, and this is where they appear.
- The A47 and A11: these are National Highways roads, so county council pages will not list them. The A47 Thickthorn scheme page carries the current traffic management and planned closures.
Frequently asked questions
What roads are closed in Norwich right now?
The Ipswich Road junction with Daniels Road is closed for traffic light replacement until 25 August 2026. Bethel Street and Earlham Green Lane and Bowthorpe Road have short evening closures on 12 and 13 August for lining work. Norfolk County Council publishes each closure as a dated notice.
Who is responsible for roadworks in Norwich?
Norfolk County Council is the highway authority for every road in the city except the A47 and A11, which are National Highways roads. Norwich City Council does not maintain roads.
Is the Norwich Western Link being built?
No. The planning application was withdrawn in January 2025 over an unresolved Natural England objection about barbastelle bats. Norfolk County Council is now assessing options, including options that are not a new road, and has no consented route or start date.
How long will the A47 Thickthorn works last?
National Highways gives completion as 2028/29. Through 2026 the A47 westbound is a single lane until a contraflow switch in October, and the A11 is due to close completely from 18 to 21 September for a bridge installation.
How much does Norwich park and ride cost?
£3 an adult, £2 for 5 to 19 year olds and concessions, £4 for two people and £5 for a group of up to five. Parking at the site is free.
Which Norwich park and ride is best for the hospital?
Costessey, on Long Lane. It is the only site with a direct service to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, and its buses do not run into the city centre at all.
Sources
- Public Information Notices, Norfolk County Council and the individual notices for Ipswich Road and Daniels Road, Bethel Street and Earlham Green Lane and Bowthorpe Road, for the dates, times, costs and the 351 miles figure.
- A47 Thickthorn junction near Norwich, National Highways for the scheme cost, what is being built, the lane arrangements, the September A11 closure and the 2028/29 completion date.
- New options assessment work for Norwich Western Link, Norfolk County Council, 27 June 2025, for the withdrawn planning application, the barbastelle bat objection, the £1.43m options work and the position on a dual carriageway.
- Park and Ride sites, Travel Norfolk for the six sites, addresses, space counts, bus frequencies and overnight parking rule, and Park and Ride, Travel Norfolk for the fares.
- one.network, the roadworks map Norfolk County Council itself links to for utility works.
Roadworks move. Surface dressing in particular is weather dependent and slips by days. Everything above was checked against the authorities’ own notices on 9 August 2026; check the live map before you set out.
Have your say
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