Lymm ban is costly
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AN ESTIMATED 000,000 a year has been added to haulage operators' costs because of a ban imposed by Warrington Borough Council on petrol, chemical and liquified gas tankers in Lymm village centre, according to a study by the Transport and Road Research Laboratory. About 220 heavy lorries a day are diverted away from the village.
Many of these vehicles carry hazardous loads from the industrial complexes of Carrington and Partington.
Experimental lorry control was introduced in September 1978, in response to concern by residents and planners, but monitoring by the Road Research Laboratory concluded that it had "not proved possible" to evaluate the effects of the ban on accidents.
Diverted vehicles used better, but longer routes — increasing the cost to operators by an average of £1.50 per oneway trip and totalling nearly £100,000 a year.
"Although diverted hgvs no longer face the special hazards of the restricted routes, they now travel further on busier, though better, roads and pass more dwellings," states the report.