Curfew campaigning • Opposition is growing against plans for a
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night-time and Sunday lorry ban on roads around Southampton. The city council has drawn up a draft proposal to ban trucks over 7.5 tonnes GVW from all city-centre roads except the Western Approach M271/A35/A3024 road to Southampton docks.
The council hopes this move will channel heavy goods traffic away from residential areas. But the idea has been attacked by the port and the local hauliers, who are lobbying their MPs and the Secretary of State for Transport, John MacGregor. They are calling for a review of the whole transport system in the city.
Bob Terris, managing director of Meachers Transport in Southampton and local Road Haulage Association representative, describes the idea as "totally impracticable".
"The Western Approach road is already heavily congested and now they want to push more and more traffic on to the road," he says.
A public inquiry into the scheme is expected later this year. Richard Powell, head of the council's Engineering Policy Division, says: "We are hoping to channel traffic through the Western approach road so freeing the other residential roads."