A PROPOSED improvement scheme for a stretch of road known as Death Valley offers good value for money, according to safety campaigners.

Wiltshire County Council's £8m plan for the Heytesbury to Codford section of the A36 is currently being considered by the Government.

An announcement is due next month on whether the scheme will get provisional Government funding.

Citing the latest Department of Transport figures, campaigners say the improvement would cost the equivalent of dealing with two years' worth of accidents on the stretch.

In the period between November 2002 and August 2003 accident costs came to just over £3.5m.

The majority of these accidents, which included three fatalities, were at the section's blackspots such as the B390 Knook junction and the Upton Lovell turning.

Campaigner and Codford Parish Council chairman Romy Wyeth has compiled extensive crash statistics for the three-mile stretch.

She said: "The urgent need on road safety grounds to address the recurring problems on these accident blackspots have been addressed within the proposed road scheme.

"Some casualty accidents, of which there are many, are not recorded. But the available data shows this short stretch of the A36 has been the scene of 51 accidents totalling 96 casualties in the last six years."