SOUTH Devon’s long-awaited link road between Newton Abbot and Torquay unexpectedly opened in the middle of the night - but by daylight traffic jam headaches were back with a vengeance.

Traffic was moving sweetly from Exeter towards Toray but Exeter-bound traffic was bumper-to-bumper in a rush-hour which clogged up Newton Abbot, no stranger to gridlock mayhem.

Among those caught up in the nightmare was Newton Abbot town councillor Chris Coyle-Moore, who complained this morning: ‘It was a complete shambles - a total nightmare.’

He thundered: ‘They’ve spent all this money and time on a road which has made things worse.’

Hiccups became a haemorrhage when Exeter-bound traffic from Newton Abbot tried to funnel its way on to the Besigheim Way slip-road at the end of the new flyover, where only one lane instead of two was open.

What single-lane traffic that did get onto the A380 then created a jam for the Torquay stream of vehicles heading for Exeter on the new road.

Tailbacks quickly established themselves back towards Torquay and Newton Abbot which in turn held up traffic coming from the Aller estates and Milber.

Mr Coyle-Moore said the family’s school run from Queensway took half-an-hour.

He felt the source of the problem was the bridge-strengthening work over the River Teign viaduct, which spoiled the Galliford-Try party.

‘The contractors should have talked to each other. The new road was opened too soon. They were in a rush. Newton Abbot was totally gridlocked,’ he complained.

The new £110 million road opened without any fuss at 4am.

A spokesman for new link road’s project team said this morning: ‘Today the South Devon Highway opened to traffic. It was a successful operation that took place in the early hours of the morning.‘Feedback from motorists has been positive and we have been overwhelmed with the compliments that people have sent.’But she added: ‘Traffic along the new road is flowing well, although we are aware that there was some slow moving traffic through the Teign Viaduct works. This caused some minor delays at peak time, in the area of Penn Inn roundabout.‘Over the last six months South Devon Highway works have been successfully coordinated with the Teign Viaduct programme to minimise disruption to traffic. ‘The South Devon Highway was opened as early as possible to alleviate heavy traffic through the village of Kingskerswell.‘We understand that the lane closure is due to be removed later this week which will allow traffic to flow freely along the new road as expected.’A spokesman for Devon County Council said: 'The traffic management at Teign Estuary viaduct will be stripped back tonight with just a lane closure over Ware Barton left in place, and this will significantly help traffic flow.'This last lane closure will also be removed on Friday, December 18, and the viaduct will then be fully open.'