In message , John Rowland
writes

Because it is several decades newer than every other road within a 3 mile
radius, except for cul-de-sacs, industrial estate roads, bypasses, and roads
built on the former Hendon Aerodrome. Unlike any of the other new roads, it
turned two previously sleepy neighbourhoods into the shortest through route
from Hatch End and Wealdstone to Central London, and the construction of
such a road goes totally against everything that is considered good in
transport planning - in fact, its strategic location as a cut-through means
that it is exactly the sort of road which, had it been built at the same
time as the neighbouring estates, would probably have been subsequently
blocked, or at least width-restricted, but there is not even much on the way
of speed bumps anywhere near it.

Could it have been built to improve emergency-vehicle access?

--
Paul Terry