Residents of a Monmouthshire village are celebrating the completion of work to make a stretch of road safer for pedestrians after years of campaigning.

County Councillor, Jan Butler, has been leading a campaign for four years to see a pedestrian crossing built on the A4042 just outside the village. The road, which is reduced from a 50mph to a 40mph speed limit in the village, has been the subject of safety concerns for locals for a number of years.

Anyone wishing to catch the bus to Abergavenny has to cross the road to do so, and until now they have had to walk over the busy A-road without any measures to protect them. In April 2025, a motorcyclist in his 60s died in a collision on the road between Llanover and Goytre.

“I feel absolutely fantastic today,” Cllr Butler told The Chronicle.

“It’s been a long journey. When I moved to Goytre almost 14 years ago I couldn’t believe how difficult the situation was at this junction. There is lots of traffic along this road with drivers waiting a long time to get onto the road safely.”

“For people actually using the junction it gives them more opportunity to get out into the road as well. I think it has just got to make it safer for pedestrians and for cars. I sincerely hope that.”

Villagers came together for a ceremonial crossing on Monday lunchtime to hail the installation of the new safer route to the other side of the road, where a new bus stop with a digital flag to track estimated arrival time of buses in real time has also been built.

As the A4042 is a trunk road, its maintenance falls under the responsibility of the Welsh Government, not the local authority. As a result, the crossing was paid for by the government after councillors and Senedd Members persistently made the case for the crossing to be built.

The road in full had seen over 180 collisions in the five years leading up to 2025 and over half of those have been considered ‘serious’ or ‘fatal’.

Welsh Labour were in power in Cardiff Bay at the time, and their interim Leader, Ken Skates MS, who was held the transport portfolio in the Cabinet, said he also recognised the need for a solution to the safety concerns in the area.

The campaign for a safe route in Goytre has been supported by the re-elected Senedd Member for Sir Fynwy Torfaen, Peter Fox MS.

“Imagine how hard it would be for somebody who is a little frail or elderly, let alone somebody who is fit, to cross the road when there are such high volumes of traffic here,” he said.

“People have literally been forced to take their lives into their own hands. Yet that is the only way they can cross to get to the bus in the direction they wanted to go. It just made common sense.”