South Wokingham Distributor Road

Why we're building the South Wokingham Distributor Road

We’re committed to providing 2,500 new homes at the South Wokingham major development, including 1,800 to the south of the railway.

The South Wokingham Distributor Road will create access for these new homes and minimise the impact of increased traffic, as agreed in our Local Plan.

You can see a diagram of the route (PDF) which the finished road will take.

Progress update: February 2025

Enabling works to allow us to complete the South Wokingham Distributor Road started on 20 January 2025, with main construction due to start in Spring 2025.

The main works will involve some road closures and diversions at the junction of Molly Millars Lane and Finchampstead Road.

They will also involve closing a section of Easthampstead Road between Waterloo Road and Heathlands Road including the level crossing.

However, these won’t start until later in the year and we’ll update these pages in full well before then - including a timetable and full explanation of how you could be affected.

We’re expecting all works on this project to finish by the end of 2026.

Keep up with the latest news

Please bear with us while we finalise all the details, but if you have an urgent query then please email our project partners at Balfour Beatty.

In the meantime, please sign up to our South Wokingham community newsletter for regular updates or read more in our latest media release.

You can also check our interactive map to learn more about all expected disruption on the borough’s roads, or subscribe to our Traffic and Travel newsletter. 

How we chose the route for the road

We considered 3 potential routes and consulted on them in early 2014. We found a clear public preference (81 per cent) for Option B, the central alignment, and made a technical recommendation to take this forward.

Our Executive approved this in November 2014, subject to minor route refinements. 

In March 2015, our Executive approved plans for the Eastern Gateway section to be progressed, before the rest of the distributor road. This section, serving the Montague Park estate with a new bridge over the railway line, fully opened 

Drop in exhibitions for the next phase of the road took place in Spring 2019. Residents were invited to comment before a planning application was submitted later in the year.

Project overview

The South Wokingham Distributor Road is being built in sections, as follows:

• Montague Park - The section, called William Heelas Way in Montague Park, was completed in Summer 2015 by David Wilson Homes as part of the housing development
• Eastern Gateway - This joins the previously completed section of William Heelas Way through the Montague Park development with Waterloo Road
• Central section and Western Gateway - From the Eastern Gateway section the SWDR will run west across Easthampstead Road to Finchampstead Road, connecting at the existing Tesco roundabout. The junction of Molly Millars Lane and Finchampstead Road will be improved, a scheme known as Western Gateway.