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156 
A5 feels weight of dissent
Page 7
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Heavy hauliers are fighting plans to re-route abnormally large loads away from the AS onto the M6 toll motorway which opens next year.
The switch is being made because three 45 bridges which cross the motorway are not designed to cope with loads of more than 150 tonnes.
The Heavy Transport Association says all eastwest journeys through the West Midlands will be restricted to between midnight and Sam as a result, and are likely to incur high charges as well.
HU chairman Dave Collett, also managing director of Halifax-based 11 Collett & Son Transport, says: "We're hearing rumours that they are talking about hundreds of pounds to use that stretch of road."
The KA argues that the 45 has been the traditional east-west route for heavy loads and therefore should continue to be maintained for that work.
But a spokesman for the Department for Transport says that loads weighing more than 150 tonnes are extremely rare. "There are only a couple of hundred of those a year nationally. We are talking about loads which are more than three times the size of a 44-tonne lorry."