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Factfile - Images - Timeline - Exit List

Location map Think of this as a two-way spur from the M4. It actually connects Reading to Bracknell more than anything else, but still counts as a spur since it's barely a through route in its own right.

The motorway was shortened - for no real reason - as part of a park and ride scheme; what was the top section became the A3290. Oh the imagination. An employee of Berkshire County Council has confirmed that the council's Park and Ride scheme would have put a bus lane on the A329(M) without reclassification, but the Highways Agency wouldn't let them do it without downgrading to an A-road because they wanted to be the first to implement a motorway bus lane, which they subsequently did on the M4.

Will Proudfoot adds the secret reason this road is so important:

It is actually part of a vital through route which needs to be motorway in entirety. If you travel from Kent, Sussex, or Surrey to anywhere on the M4 from Reading to Swansea, you never go round the M25 to the M4 junction. No, you go off the M25 on the M3, then turn off onto the A329 and head through Bracknell. There is 1/2 a mile of nasty slow S2 in Bracknell, but otherwise this is a much faster route than the alternative, and is helped by the excellent junction at the M4 and the wonderful A329(M).

Funny you should say that, Will... The reason the A329(M) has such an enormous, overblown junction with the M4 is that this stubby spur is the washed-up remains of the M31. This much grander scheme would have seen a motorway from the M4 to the M3 via Bracknell Forest, possibly with a further connection to what is now the M25. The Pathetic Motorways website has the details.

Factfile

Start	Reading (A3290)
Finish	Bracknell (A329)
Passes	None
Length	4 miles
Terminates	None
Spurs	None
Meets	M4

Images

Views of the A329(M) from on and off the road. If you have a photo to contribute, contact me.

On the A3290 approaching the point where the motorway now starts - a non-primary road with a huge signs and a hard shoulder looks quite odd.
Photo by Dave Ryan

Looking north between there and the M4. The A329(M) is the last rural motorway not to have central crash barriers; however the width of the central reservation (probably designed to take a third lane when the motorway was extended) negates this problem.
Photo by Dave Ryan

The scale of the M4 interchange is unbelievable for a road the size of the A329(M) - here's one of the tightest sliproads, and they're not very tight at all.
Photo by Dave Ryan

Construction Timeline

When the various parts of the A329(M) were built, listed in chronological order.

Open	Section
1973	Entire motorway

Exit List

All the junctions and destinations along the route.

Junction	Westbound				Eastbound
	Reading A3290	(A329)	WEST A3290		N/A

	Earley Winnersh (A329)
	2 miles, 2 lanes				2 miles, 2 lanes
(M4 J10)	The WEST Reading (S & W) Newbury M4	M4		M4	London Slough Heathrow M4

	London Slough Heathrow M4				The WEST Reading (S & W) Newbury M4
	3 miles, 2 lanes				3 miles, 2 lanes
	N/A	A329	A329 EAST	B3408	Bracknell A329

					Binfield B3408

					Wokingham A329