What's it like living right next to a busy A road?

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Lived next to a 40mph road in a flat which lead to a big roundabout. Absolutely hated it. Flat was south facing and pretty much all glass so it was 35 degrees+ in the summer, opening the windows to put the aircon unit house made it so noisy you couldn’t watch the TV.

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Electronic-Writer108@reddit

lol it’s pretty normal to live on an A road. I’ve never really thought about it not being normal..? Of course when it veers into 3/4 way lanes is this what you mean? Or just a standard A road? The A1 goes through some really posh areas so a lot of people I guess would rather live on the road to stay in a particular area.

Do the rest of the U.K. not have A roads running through towns & cities?

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Kind-Blackberry-6221@reddit (OP)

Yeah I was talking the two lane areas of the A1 that I passed through, so Sandy/Biggleswade/Buckden/etc where there are houses that are right on a really busy stretch of road and cars are just parked in a layby next to the constant busy fast moving traffic. I just wondered whether people lived there for convenience, price or something else, and what it's like.

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Electronic-Writer108@reddit

Never heard of those places I had to google lol. They aren’t in London, no idea why anyone would live there on a busy road!

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Kind-Blackberry-6221@reddit (OP)

Thanks all! I was just curious :)

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Flaramon@reddit

The A-road here dies at night, so it's peaceful. We are close to an exit, so we quite often get high speed traffic during the day. You only really notice the noise if you have your window open. The real pain in the butt for residents here is that a police station is setup to use this A-road. It means we get a lot of emergency traffic & sirens.

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brushfuse@reddit

I’ve never seen kids playing in the front garden of these places, that speaks volumes. The A1 and A4 have houses right next to them. People even avoid this as a walking route, it’s too loud and too polluted.

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el_diablo420@reddit

I live about 500m from the m4. The noise is so annoying and constant. Moving soon and cannot wait

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urban_shoe_myth@reddit

We lived facing a dual carriageway for nearly 8 years. It didn't take long to just tune out the traffic noise, unless it was some idiot with a loud exhaust doing 90 at 3am. It was handy for gauging the weather before getting up though, we could hear whether the road was wet or dry.

The front of the house was always dirty and dusty, as were our cars as the drive was right next to the road. At the back of the house it was fine though. We didn't notice any particular health issues.

The worst thing was the occasional gridlock if there were roadworks at any point along the 3 mile-ish stretch we lived by, we wouldnt be able to get out of our drive. Similarly because we were close to two major motorway junctions (M62 and M1), if there was anything happening on either motorway and people had come off to avoid the accident/roadworks/whatever, they would divert along the dual carriageway to the next junction or on to the other motorway and it would be carnage.

We chose to buy there because the house was 100-150k cheaper than a mile down the road (set back) where we'd been renting, still near the kids school, good bus route and motorway links, 20 minutes away from a major city centre, three town centres, and an out of town shopping centre. It was perfect for what we needed at the time.

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GeggingIn@reddit

My first flat was right next to the motorway that runs through Glasgow.

You do get used to it, but it was smoggy when you opened the windows.

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mrggy@reddit

There are some studies that show that living near a motorway (within a quarter mile, if I'm remembering correctly) leads to noticely reduced indoor air quality, even when the windows are closed

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GeggingIn@reddit

Sure that’s right. It certainly didn’t feel optimal.

Would say though, I do have good memories of that flat. Despite the constant noise and deadly fumes, it was affordable and close to good stuff.

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KingslandGrange@reddit

Some developer is building a new housing estate on a sliver of land near us.

The houses upstairs windows will be pretty much at road level on the M6. Gonna be grim.

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Darkus185@reddit

I live near a bit of the A38 that is no longer actually the A38 but all the traffic still goes past my house even though signs reroute said traffic.

I started wearing earplugs as I couldn’t sleep at all. It wasn’t a continuous drone of traffic but it was one individual car after the other which is worse in my opinion.

The problem is now I struggle to sleep without ear plugs even when it is quiet. It’s like a comfort I can’t do without.

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dgz1990@reddit

Lived next to a busy junction connecting a B to an A. Never get used to it, not if you have anxiety or issues with noise. Always heightened.

Really depends on your personality and what triggers you

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Brizzledude65@reddit

Though I live 25 minutes walk from the city centre, my road is incredibly quiet, just the usual hum of city noise in the background. Just how I like it, I lived on an A road (on a hill used by a lot of quarry trucks and HGVs to make it worse) years ago when renting. Never again.

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FlatTyres@reddit

You know when it's the summer and you want to open the window to try and cool down? Well, if you live near one, you eventually get used to the road noise including at night (with occasional disturbances from people who drive with loud or custom exhausts, revving) but if you play games online with mics in TeamSpeak, Ventrilo or the newer Discord you end up with people in the same chat channel asking you to close your window or switch to push-to-talk because the mics will pic up the noise and transmit it, or at least they did when I used them 12-16 years ago.

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ThrowRAkitty13@reddit

You might be able to get used to the noise, but there is some articles stating that living near busy roads can put you at increased risk of certain health issues.

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taulish_paul@reddit

Noise and air pollution. Health impacts are probably worse than anyone's letting on.

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Bibblejw@reddit

We're not next to, but Google's distance measure has us about 500m from the M1, and, honestly, haven't had much but good things. Don't really notice the noise (more obvious from the logistics depots when the alarms go off), not really had any issues with air quality (not that's noticeable anyway).

The major thing is that all your local routes basically immediately snarl up as soon as there's an issue on the motorway. That's going to be a thing anywhere, but it's almost immediate here (with the advent of real-time traffic, everything quickly gets pushed to the same alternate routes).

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uncertain_expert@reddit

The noise is one thing sure. Other aspects that you might not consider: -we don’t just wash the windows, we wash the whole front of the house (as much as we can reach anyway). It gets filthy.

-property maintenance is challenging if there is no space to erect scaffolding. You might be expected to use a wheeled elevated work platform, which needs specific training. Not something your average painter or roofer will have.

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blackcurrantcat@reddit

I used to live on an (I think) A road and while I got used to it, to think back it was actually kind of shit. There was traffic noise all the time (which I got used to) but we rented and there was no double glazing and the amount of black dust that managed to get in through the poorly fitting wooden windows was worrying. I also used to think all the time, what if someone crashes, they could literally just barge through my walls. Which could happen on any road but the volume of traffic made it much more likely. Also a bus route with double deckers went past and the top deck was in line with my (front) bedroom window so there’s that.

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DameKumquat@reddit

Noisy and you used not to be able to put washing out as it would get smutty.

I'm about 80 yards from a slow-moving London A road, and it's fine, but I'm not altogether sad we couldn't afford the nicely done-up house only 20 yards away, as they really do get the noise, especially in summer with windows open and all the nee-nahs.

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clovenheart1066@reddit

Not an A road, but i lived in a terraced that was immediately on one of the main road into our town, off the A6. Like you could smack someones window hanging out the front door.

It was our first home, cheap but lovely.

We used to wake up and wonder how we slept so well, so deeply? And then find out the road flooded, so there was no traffic. When the road flooded, it was a perfect little culdesac.

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Representative_Pin80@reddit

Lived in Hendon right on the A1. It was awful. Noise and pollution meant I couldn’t open windows during the day. Or the evening for that matter. Windows were double glazed but you could still hear the traffic. Had to wear earplugs to get to sleep. I wouldn’t recommend it.

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shaneo632@reddit

Your house will get dusty super fast.

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Chelz91@reddit

I have a relative that lives along the A406/A10 intersection… miraculously it’s silent in her house. You can’t hear any of it and even in the garden still pretty silent. You can however smell in the air when there’s a lot of traffic

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Dachshund-forever@reddit

Not exactly the same but I live less than 1 mile as the crow files to the M5 and also on the junction so have the inner ring road traffic as well. You don’t hear it much it indoors really only at night. I’ve been here 17 years and the roads have got busy in that time especially at night. Where there use to be a good few hours where there was nothing it’s now maybe one or two. I generally haven’t really noticed it and even in the garden it’s there if you tune your mind to it and it has got louder due to the increased traffic. The black dust is a pain on white upvc windows and doors especially after it rains constant fight to keep clean. I’ve developed noxacusis in recent years so it is now a big deal as putting the washing out isn’t pleasant and can no longer enjoy my garden so looking to move away from it.

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littleduckcake@reddit

I used to live on the north circular. Was fine until it got hot then it was not great. Balancing having the windows open with being kept awake by road noise. I was a student hence the living situation and no fan/AC etc...

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domsp79@reddit

We live next to the A38 but we also live in a Victorian house with really thick walls and decent windows.

You still hear it sometimes but I notice it far less than my wife does.

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Flat___________@reddit

I know someone who lives right next to (pedestrian pavement width) from a busy ish village high street (30mph) and it’s bloody awful!

Can’t imagine what it would be like next to an A road 😫

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Villianofthepeace@reddit

My road is quite busy but with double glazing etc I hardly notice the traffic, only time I hear it is the summer when the chavs go past with their noisy exhausts and the windows are open… although I could sleep on a washing line and fall asleep in a matters of minutes lol

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