WILTSHIRE TIMES EXCLUSIVE: GRIEVING widow Brenda Johnson has backed a campaign for a bypass to improve safety along the road which claimed her husband's life.

Speaking on Wednesday, a day after husband Brian's funeral, she made an emotional plea urging Wiltshire County Council to fund a bypass for Beanacre.

Her 62-year-old husband was involved in a three-car smash on the busy stretch of the A350 near Melksham on December 3, but died from his injuries three weeks later.

Mrs Johnson hopes the local authority will listen to local residents' demands for a relief road because she does not want more families to experience the same devastation.

She said: "Before going to work Brian would often say there had been another accident at Beanacre. Residents deserve a bypass because it is an awful road."

Mr Johnson, of The Mount, Trow-bridge, was seriously injured in the 7am crash and was pulled by two men from his burning Ford Focus car moments before it was engulfed in flames.

His wife praised Chris Fardell, of Trowbridge, and Peter Rogers, a lorry driver for the Faccenda Group on the West Wilts Trading Estate, for their heroics. Mr Johnson was rushed to the RUH in Bath for emergency surgery after sustaining fractures to his skull, pelvis, and lower back, chest wounds and a broken arm.

He was later transferred to the hospital's Intensive Therapy Unit (ITU) but never regained consciousness and died on December 23.

Mrs Johnson, 60, who renewed her wedding vows with her husband at Gretna Green last June to celebrate their 40th wedding anniversary, said: "When I was told about the accident I just went numb.

"Even though we knew it was serious we were still holding on to hope that he would pull through."

Beanacre residents are planning to bring traffic on the A350 to a standstill in the second of a series of protests on January 31.

Gary Jardine, 55, is spearheading the campaign, which is being backed by the Wiltshire Times, because he says up to 22,000 vehicles thunder through the village every day. He is also urging people to sign petitions which will be sent to roads' minister Lord Whitty.

"We are not happy about the fact it could take until 2016 to get a bypass," he said.

Wiltshire County Council has warned bidding for a bypass could take several years and the application would then have to secure government funding.

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