Highways England is to showcase its updated plans for a 1.9-mile road tunnel project near Stonehenge to international heritage experts.

A delegation from the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) and UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) are embarking on a three-day fact-finding mission exploring how designs for the £1.6 billion scheme will bring together the site's landscape which is currently split by the A303 between Amesbury and Berwick Down.

Since last September, Highways England has continued to work with heritage groups including the National Trust, Historic England, English Heritage, and experts in the field, including the Stonehenge Scientific Committee - to ensure a new route is built sensitively to the World Heritage Site.


The route was carefully chosen to avoid monuments and barrow groups, and Highways England's modified plans also included moving the position of one of the entrances to the tunnel to avoid conflicting with the Winter Solstice alignment.

A public consultation outlining the first time initial designs for the tunnel is being held until 06 April.

Derek Parody, Highways England Project Director, said: "As well as removing the traffic bottleneck at Stonehenge and addressing the rat-running issue through villages, our proposed scheme will remove the sight and sound of traffic from the iconic monument and reduce intrusion in the wider world heritage site.

"We've been working closely with heritage groups to best develop the route to minimise the impact on Stonehenge and the surrounding landscape.

"These groups have been key, along with environmental, archaeological and geophysical surveys, to our building our knowledge and understanding of this unique landscape and helped us develop the design of our preferred route."

(LM/MH)