The A363 is a main road in the United Kingdom which runs through

Bath and North East Somerset Bath and North East Somerset (B&NES) is a unitary authority district in England. Bath and North East Somerset Council was created on 1 April 1996 following the abolition of the county of Avon. It is part of the ceremonial county of Somerset. Th ...

and

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated Wilts) is a historic and ceremonial county in South West England with an area of . It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset to the southwest, Somerset to the west, Hampshire to the southeast, Gloucestershire ...

. It provides a link between the small

market town A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village or city. In Britain, small rural ...

s of West Wiltshire and Bath, the M4 westbound, and the M5. It runs from the A4 at Bathford to the

A350 The Airbus A350 is a long-range, wide-body twin-engine jet airliner developed and produced by Airbus. The first A350 design proposed by Airbus in 2004, in response to the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, would have been a development of the A330 w ...

at Yarnbrook, passing through Bradford-on-Avon and Trowbridge. It also links Westbury by merging with the A350.

Route

The road starts off bypassing Bathford to the west. It then climbs up the hill known locally as ''Sally in the Woods'', on the edge of the

Cotswolds The Cotswolds (, ) is a region in central-southwest England, along a range of rolling hills that rise from the meadows of the upper Thames to an escarpment above the Severn Valley and Evesham Vale. The area is defined by the bedrock of Jur ...

Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, which has been the scene of a fatal accident. The road summits at the turn-off to

Monkton Farleigh Monkton Farleigh is a village and civil parish in west Wiltshire, England, on high ground northwest of Bradford-on-Avon, and a similar distance east of the city of Bath. The parish includes the hamlets of Farleigh Wick and Pinckney Green. In th ...

, at an altitude of 144 metres. After this, the road quality improves in that it widens and is straighter. This continues up to the approach to Bradford-on-Avon. Through Bradford-on-Avon itself, the road descends a steep 1 in 7 (14%) hill, known as ''Masons Lane''. This is the road's main bottleneck since this leads to Bradford-on-Avon's only vehicle bridge over the River Avon (which splits the town in two), and at this stage travellers have merged with traffic from Melksham, Corsham and

Chippenham Chippenham is a market town A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village ...

( B3109) which is fed here. The road passes on towards Trowbridge. 1/4 mile (400 m) after ''Town Bridge'', traffic to Frome splits off upon the restart of the B3109 which had been concurrent with the A363 for a short distance, thus easing congestion. The road passes over a low hill, then descends into Trowbridge. It is concurrent for a short distance with the

A361 The A361 is an A class road in southern England, which at is the longest three-digit A road in the UK. History When first designated in 1922, the A361 ran from Taunton (Somerset) to Banbury (Oxfordshire). It was later extended west through B ...

, then emerges as ''Bradley Road''. There are three roundabouts as the road goes through

North Bradley North Bradley is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England, between Trowbridge and Westbury. The village is about south of Trowbridge town centre. The parish includes most of the village of Yarnbrook, and the hamlets of Brokerswood, Cu ...

via the White Horse Business Park, to the south. Until the 1980s it passed through North Bradley's residential lane, but since the opening of the business park, the older road through North Bradley became declassified. The A363 then terminates at a roundabout with the A350 in Yarnbrook. When it was first designated in the 1920s, the road continued on from Yarnbrook as far as

, but by 1948 this stretch had been redesignated as a continuation of the

Points of interest

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:3-0363 Roads in England Transport in Wiltshire Roads in Somerset