A weekly newspaper has been praised by the Transport Secretary for a campaign which calls for a busy road to be made into a dual carriageway.

The Western Gazette launched its Dual It! campaign last October calling for improvements to be made to the A303 in a bid to boost the economy and improve road safety.

And the campaign had a breakthrough last month when the road was listed in a government announcement on future infrastucture spending, so improvements are expected to be made.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin has now praised the newspaper for its campaign and said it did influence the government’s decision to look into upgrading the A303.

Editor Emma Slee said: “We are delighted that our message about the much needed improvements needed for the A303 is being heard at the highest level. However, we will continue to campaign until action is taken.”

Mr McLoughlin told the paper: “The Western Gazette has run a very effective campaign and I was very impressed by what I saw when I visited Somerset. Without a doubt it has had an impact.

“I became aware of the campaign not only through my dealings with constituency MPs but through the daily reports from my civil servants who monitor what is happening in the regions and what the newspapers are saying.”

As part of the campaign, the paper gathered more than 3,000 signatures from readers and also launched an interactive map of the A303, showing all the crashes which occurred along the Somerset stretch of the road between 2006 and 2011.

It also met Mr McLoughlin in the spring and presented him with a dossier of the title’s coverage about the road.