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Lancashire calls for four new motorways
Page 49
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UR new motorways in Lancashire are proposed by the County Council as extensions to the present road programme. This call for new roads is made in a report, "Lancashire Needs", published by the British Road Federation.
Sir Fred Longworth, chairman of the Lancashire County Council, describes the schemes as "vital road links both to the present county road plan and the national plan". The county claims that these four schemes will help maintain the revitalization of Lancashire and North West England.
"At a critical stage in its economic development", the report says, "Lancashire is now facing a serious threat from inadequate and overloaded roads. In many parts of the county, roads are carrying four and five times the volume of traffic for which they were designed."
The four routes the county believes are essential:— • South Lancashire motorway: The proposed route would extend from the Liverpool-Huyton Road, A5080, just east of the Liverpool boundary, to the Preston-Birmingham motorway, M6, north-east of Warrington, and terminate at the Lancashire-Yorkshire motorway, M62, in Eccles. The motorway would be 22 miles long and would have dual three-lane carriageways. Estimated cost: £18.5 million.
• Blackpool motorway: This route would extend from Broughton on the M6, north of Preston, to the Blackpool-Preston trunk road, A583, at the Blackpool boundary. It would be 11.52 miles long and would have three-lane dual carriageways. Estimated cost: £9.25 million.
• North Liverpool link: The link would start at the intersection of the LiverpoolPreston trunk road, A59, the Bootle-Aintree trunk road, A567, and the programmed Liverpool outer ring road. The plan provides for a seven-mile motorway connecting the junction with the western end of the Skelmersdale New Town regional road. To construct a dual two-lane carriageway at the outset would cost £4 million. • Furness link: The link would extend from the Lancaster-Kendal trunk road, A6. just south of the Westmorland boundary and over the River Leven to the A590, east of Lindale. The 8.59 miles of motorway would cost an estimated £3.9 million.
Improved road communications are specially relevant in Lancashire where many new firms were attracted by the promise of motorway connections to the M6.
Ford chairman Sir Patrick Hennessey makes this point in a foreword to the report. Criticizing the severe congestion through which traffic has to struggle once off the M6, he points to the giant £45 million Ford plant at Halewood, largest on Merseyside. "Over 1,000 lorries rush in with components and material every day to feed the hungry production lines", he says. ". . . Halewood is vulnerable to delays in getting vital supplies through from the Midlands and the South."