History of the M58
Motorway History M58, Lancashire
W M Johnson MBE BEng CEng FICE FIHT
CONTENTS
Map of the South Lancashire Area
Administrative Matters
Introduction
Origins
The Component Parts
Development
Construction Starts
The proposed extension to M61
M58 The Aintree-Skelmersdale-M6 Motorway
Map of the South Lancashire Area
The map above is adapted from one contained in a preliminary report on the then proposed Aintree-Skelmersdale Link published in 1970 by the Lancashire County Council Sub Unit (LCSU) of the North Western Road Construction Unit (NWRCU) of the Ministry of Transport. The map shows motorways presumed to be existing in 1974 and those proposed in 1970 in relation to the designated area of the Skelmersdale New Town. It also shows the designated area of the Central Lancashire New Town, which was eventually developed in a truncated form.
Administrative Matters
An attempt to explain various administrative issues must precede the main sections of this narrative. Its aim is clarity I hope that it does not add to confusion.
Before 1974, the Lancashire County Council was the highway authority for all classified roads, other than trunk (national) roads, in Lancashire (outside the County Boroughs such as Wigan and Liverpool) and for all rural unclassifed roads. It was therefore responsible for the construction and maintenance of roads classed I, II, or III. In constructing or improving such roads it could receive a grant from central government of, for example, 75% in the case of Class I roads but the quid pro quo was that, if grant was to be obtained, permission from the relevant Ministry was required. The County Councils programme thus became, to a considerable extent, dependent on government expenditure profiles. Though in this case not the highway authority, the County Council acted as agent for the maintenance, improvement and construction of trunk roads in the County. County Boroughs carried out most functions of a county council, including highway functions, within their own areas and, in the small number of instances where trunk roads ran through those areas, often acted as trunk road agents.
In a reorganisation of local government in April 1974, the County Boroughs were abolished and the new County Councils responsibilities as highway authority extended to all roads other than trunk roads in the County. However, the size of the administrative county was reduced, particularly in the south of Lancashire, by the formation of two Metropolitan County Councils, Greater Manchester in the south east and Merseyside in the south west. The line of the Aintree-Skelmersdale-M6 motorway, after reorganisation, ran through Lancashire and both Metropolitan authorities though, primarily, through Lancashire and Merseyside. The extension from M6 to M61 was wholly within the area of the Greater Manchester Metropolitan County Council, known popularly as the GMC, though the Lancashire County Council continued to take an interest and supported the construction of the road in principle whenever the latest situation was reported to their Committee.
After only 12 years of existence, the Metropolitan County Councils were dissolved and their highway authority responsibilities devolved upon Metropolitan Boroughs[1] such as Wigan and Bolton, the two authorities through whose areas the extension to M61 ran.
The government was, and is, the highway authority for trunk roads. The executive department which exercised these responsibilities on the governments behalf was known as the Ministry of Transport and Civil Aviation when the motorway programme began and became at various times the Ministry of Transport (MoT), the Department of the Environment (DoE), the Department of Transport (DTp or DoT) and the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR). The political head of the Ministries was, not surprisingly, a Minister and, of the Departments, a Secretary of State with junior Ministers heading divisions of the Department. For example, within the Department of Transport there was a Roads Minister. In 1967, regional Road Construction Units (RCUs) were set up to supervise the design and construction of major trunk road, mainly trunk motorway, schemes. Their formation began to erode the county councils rather cosy agency arrangements with the Ministry for trunk roads despite early involvement brought about by the formation of county-based Sub Units within RCUs. Despite the dissolution of the RCUs and Sub Units early in the 1980s, this erosion of agencies and, to a great extent, influence has continued to the present day. The Highways Agency, a government agency, now looks after all aspects of trunk road and trunk road motorway work on behalf of the responsible government department and local authorities vie with consultants and contractors for work.
Within this overall picture, the Skelmersdale New Town Development Corporation was formed in the early 1960s to plan and promote the New Town. It was dissolved on 30th June 1985 when its responsibilities passed to the Commission for New Towns (CNT). The role of the Development Corporation in the funding of components of M58 is examined in the text.
Introduction
I used to feel that the production of an opening brochure at the end of an arduous contract was a troublesome chore which gave satisfaction largely to those bent upon self-promotion. My participation in the Motorway Archive has, however, taught me the error of my ways. I had no direct connection with the design or the construction of the sections of road which now form the M58 motorway and the fact that I have, by default, inherited the task of supplying a chronicle is indicative of a certain shortage of personnel willing or able to carry it out. I have previously undertaken this task on a motorway with which I was similarly unconnected but there I had to assist me, among much other documentation, a reasonably informative opening brochure which is singularly lacking in the case of the major part of M58. There is, however, among the documents, a paper prepared for a visit to the site of the Aintree-Skelmersdale Link in 1979 by members of the Institution of Municipal Engineers and this has filled some of the gaps.
I have, therefore, had to go back to my increasingly familiar friends at the Lancashire County Records Office for information. For help with events subsequent to 1974, my friends and former colleagues in the County Surveyors Department, now part of the Environment Department, of the Lancashire County Council have been extremely helpful. Not unnaturally, however deplorable this may be, the advent of Road Construction Units in 1967 cut down the information available to the Lancashire County Council. The Councils Committee minutes are thus a great deal less useful for the Aintree-Skelmersdale length than for earlier lengths of motorway.
In his book, A History of British Motorways[2] published in 1984 by Thomas Telford Ltd, the commercial arm of the Institution of Civil Engineers, Dr G Charlesworth, a former Assistant Director of the then Transport and Road Research Laboratory, a government agency, lamented that he could not get access to the policy files of the Ministry of Transport covering important decisions made about motorways. If the author, a former senior civil servant, commissioned to write on behalf of the principal British civil engineering institution, cannot see these files (if, indeed, they still exist), theres little hope for me and I am very conscious of the shortcomings of my account because of this.
There is also a very real danger that the length of the motorway from just to the west of Skelmersdale to its junction with M6 at Orrell, for which there is an opening brochure and for details of which there are good sources, will occupy a greater portion of this account than its size justifies. It is to be hoped that readers will take this disproportion into account.
Had it not been for the help I have received from RHN (Hartley) Sinclair, formerly the Superintending Engineer (Roads) of the Lancashire County Council Sub Unit of the North Western Road Construction Unit of the Department of Transport (LCSU of the NWRCU of the DTp[3]) and HL (Harry) Yeadon, formerly County Surveyor and Bridgemaster of Lancashire and Chief Engineer of the Lancashire Sub Unit, the lack of balance in this account would have been greater. I am most grateful for their help but the responsibility for the way in which I have assimilated it is mine alone.
Because it is logical to exclude it from the largely chronological account of the origins and development of M58, I propose, in the main, to deal with the proposed road from M6 to M61 in a separate section beginning on page 21. In connection with this part of my account, I am grateful for the help I have received from Paul Goodman, Head of Policy and Transport Planning of Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council.
Origins
In 1949, the Lancashire County Council published its Road Plan for Lancashire. This book, strongly driven by the then recently appointed County Surveyor, James (later Sir James) Drake, examined the needs of the county in highway terms and, using pioneering methods, produced a hierarchical list of proposals for new and improved roads. Many of its proposals have been implemented subsequently though some have not been realised, at least not in the form originally envisaged.
In 1949 the inadequacy of the A577, Wigan-Ormskirk (-Southport) road had been recognised and a Route 215 was suggested involving separate by-passes of Up Holland and Skelmersdale at that time two small villages and an improvement of the remainder of the route from Wigan[4] to Route 210. Route 210 was a proposed connection from St Helens to Southport, essentially following the line of the Trunk Road A570. The two proposed routes were to meet at Four Lane Ends, which was then the junction of A570 and B5192. Linking Route 215 to the North-South Route proposed in the Road Plan was not envisaged at that time[5] nor was any westward link to Liverpool.
The official designation of Skelmersdale as the site of a New Town took place in 1961. This designation undoubtedly increased the pressure to link Route 215 to M6; construction of the section of M6 south of Preston had started in February 1961. As the New Town was conceived to provide overspill housing for the Liverpool conurbation, the need for a better route from Skelmersdale to Liverpool also became more pressing. The confirmation of Skelmersdale as a New Town caused the Lancashire County Council to drastically revise the line of Route 215 to form a continuous new route south of the New Town and to propose a link to M6. They also proposed the extension of the route to the west to join the Trunk Road A59 at Aintree, though this, at the time, was an interim measure; the final western end of the route was seen as a junction with the proposed Liverpool-Preston Motorway.
Strategically there seems to be a direct relationship between the provision of the Aintree-Skelmersdale-M6 route and the existence, or lack of existence, of a Liverpool-Preston Motorway or, at least, a greatly improved road for northbound traffic linking Liverpool and Preston and, thus, the M6. It seems to me logical to conclude that, having provided a link from the north of Liverpool to M6 and, in doing so, solved the problems of communications with Skelmersdale, which has, in any event, not developed as far and as fast as originally envisaged[6], the attitude of successive governments, and, indeed, the Lancashire County Council, has been, not unreasonably, lukewarm to the provision of yet another link. Not counting the links via Birkenhead and the Cheshire motorways or the venerable (1932four years younger than the author!) but still reasonably effective Liverpool-East Lancashire Road (A580), Liverpool has two direct motorway links to M6; the southern route (M62) and the central (compromise?) route (M58). The third, northern route seems less and less likely to be provided.
To the east of M6, the Road Plan contained a Route 225. It was intended as a link between Wigan and Bolton and did not by pass the Wigan conurbation nor did it link to what became the M6. This route number was used, until comparatively recent times, to describe an extension of M58 through the south of Wigan to join M61 near Westhoughton and an underbridge was provided when the latter road was constructed to allow for the junction. The development of this concept will be examined in greater detail in the section headed The proposed extension to M61 beginning on page 21.
The Component Parts
It may be helpful, at this point, to give a brief chronology of the construction and modification of the various components of what ultimately became M58. It is hoped that this together with the map on page 3 will make the subsequent narrative easier to follow. An attempt has been made, in this section, to include enough landmarks to cover every description used in official documents though I am not totally confident of success.
i) Skelmersdale Regional Road. (Western part (Section 1) of the Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass)
Runs from Glenburn Road (eventually M58 Junction No 4) eastwards to Stannanought Road/Pimbo (Junction No 5). Originally with a temporary connection to the B5192 at its western end.
Constructed as a single carriageway two-lane all-purpose road by Sir Alfred McAlpine & Sons Ltd for the Lancashire County Council in 1968.
Road trunked in 1972. The Ministry of Transport became highway authority and the County Council acted as their agent.
Hardshoulder added to the existing carriageway by County Council direct labour in 1973.
Second two-lane carriageway and hardshoulder added by Tarmac Civil Engineering Ltd in 1973.
Road upgraded to dual three-lane motorway standards by Percy Bilton Ltd for the North Western Road Construction Unit of the Ministry of Transport in 1977. (part of Contract M58/2)
The Regional Road in 2000 looking west from Pimbo Lane Bridge
ii) Upholland By Pass (Skelmersdale Link to M6)(Eastern part (Section 2) of the Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass)
Runs from Stannanought Road/Pimbo (Junction No 5) eastwards to M6 with a link from the M6 junction to A577 at Orrell.
Constructed as a dual two-lane all-purpose road by Dowsett Engineering Construction Ltd for the Lancashire County Council in 1970. The Orrell link between M6 and A577 was constructed under the same contract as a single two-lane carriageway.
Road trunked in 1972. The Ministry of Transport became highway authority and the County Council acted as their agent.
Hardshoulders added to the existing dual carriageways by County Council direct labour in 1973.
Road upgraded to dual three-lane motorway standards by Percy Bilton Ltd for the North Western Road Construction Unit of the Ministry of Transport in 1977. (part of Contract M58/2)
iii) Aintree-Skelmersdale Link
Runs from a junction with Liverpool-Preston Trunk Road A59, A567 and Liverpool Outer Ring Road M57 at Aintree eastwards to join the Skelmersdale Regional Road (see above) at Glenburn Road. A uni-directional eastward-facing junction (No 1) was provided at Maghull Lane and a normal junction (No 3) at Bickerstaffe connected with the A570 Trunk Road. The missing junction number (No 2) was intended for the Liverpool-Preston motorway which has, so far, not been built and, though never covers a long time period, probably never will be.
Constructed as a dual carriageway two-lane motorway from Aintree to Junction No 1 with three lanes thence to Glenburn Road by the Sir Alfred McAlpine (Northern) Ltd/Leonard Fairclough Ltd Consortium for the North Western Road Construction Unit in 1980. (Contracts M58/1 and M58/3)
i)-iii) Aintree-Skelmersdale-M6 Motorway M58
On completion of the entire length from Aintree to Junction 26 on M6, the road was given motorway status as M58.
iv) Mid Lancashire Motorway (Described in a separate section beginning on page 21)
Though not yet built and, therefore, not strictly a part of M58, this length of road was planned as a continuation of M58 running east from M6, Junction No 26, at Orrell to a junction with M61 at Westhoughton. It has been variously described in official documents as, among other descriptions, the M6 to M61 Link (Wigan, Hindley and Westhoughton Bypass), the M58M61 Link Road (Route 225) and the AintreeSkelmersdaleM6 to M61 Motorway (South of Wigan Section). This multiplicity of names may seem odd but is not unusual in Lancashires motorway history. Indeed, there is rather more excuse in this case as these three titles, together with the, always inaccurate but, since 1974, even more so, Mid Lancashire Motorway, came from three different highway authorities or groupings of highway authorities and not just from the Lancashire County Council. It now looks likely that, if this road is ever built, it will not be a motorway.
Development
The M58 motorway was a comparatively late developer in the history of Lancashires motorways. In November 1959, for example, the Highways and Bridges Committee of the then Lancashire County Council approved a big list of schemes to be carried out in the four years following 1961/62. There was no mention of M58 or any of its components though the Ormskirk-Burcough By Pass and the Maghull By Pass on the Liverpool-Preston Trunk Road A59 were included. Two and a half years later, the County Council was campaigning in association with the Lancashire and Merseyside Industrial Development Association for links to the proposed North-South Motorway (M6), among them, links at Wigan North and Wigan South but no mention of any other in the vicinity. The Committee[7] discussed the need for links from South and Central Liverpool to M6; this discussion clearly related to what is now M62 but the then current proposals from the Ministry of Transport for a new East-West road apparently stopped somewhere in the Worsley area, some 22 miles short of Liverpool. This missing link was referred to as the Merseyside Expressway but there was still no hint of any part of M58 figuring in even a wish-list.
Finally in October 1962, the County Council decided to make a start. In a list of schemes for which the Council proposed as the highway authority and for which authority was given for the purchase of land in advance appeared Skelmersdale and Upholland By-Pass. From B5192 near Primrose Farm to connection with motorway M6 at a rough estimated cost of 3,750,000. The County Council clearly saw this road as a by pass of villages on the A577, Wigan-Ormskirk road, which was, by the standards of the time, congested, and as a link to the proposed North-South Motorway. No link to Liverpool was envisaged at this time. The idea of a New Town at Skelmersdale had not been officially mooted until 1961 when a draft Skelmersdale New Town (Designation) Order was published. The Skelmersdale New Town Development Corporation was set up to manage the New Towns growth and was dissolved in June 1985 when the Commission for New Towns (CNT) took over the Corporations residual assets and responsibilities.
In dealing with this section of road directly, the County Council was facing facts. As a limb of the proposed North-South Motorway and as a simple by pass on a Class I or Principal Road[8] for which it was the highway authority, there was clearly no chance of the road becoming a trunk road and thus becoming a Ministry of Transport responsibility. The Ministry[9] was, of course, the highway authority for all trunk roads which, by definition, linked major centres of population with ports or with each other. Often, local authorities campaigned for a certain existing or proposed road to be designated as a trunk road. If successful in the case of an existing road, they would lose a considerable financial liability in the form of improvement and maintenance costs but they would also lose a large element of influence on the programming of any work. In the case of a proposed road, of course, they would, in addition, be relieved of the costs of design and construction. If a road was trunked, becoming a Ministry responsibility, the County Council could only attempt to apply political pressure in their attempts to hasten a roads provision or improvement. As years passed, this type of pressure became decreasingly effective.
It often seemed to be (and probably still is) the case that the Ministrys unwillingness to trunk a road before construction was for narrow financial reasons rather than as a result of a dispassionate evaluation of the role of the proposed road. In the case of parts of what ultimately became M58, the Ministry refused requests from the County Council to trunk the road only to trunk it within two years of its construction. They thus loaded 25% of the construction cost on to the Lancashire ratepayer instead of the taxpayer by giving 75% grant instead of paying 100% of the cost. I am sure that the civil servants and national politicians concerned convinced themselves that they had got the road on the cheap even though the total cost to the public purse was unchanged. This sort of rather futile exercise was repeated in more virulent form in the negotiations with the Skelmersdale New Town Development Corporation described later in this narrative.
In December 1963, pressure was again put on the Ministry of Transport for a motorway between Liverpool and Preston when the Committee backed a request from the West Lancashire Rural District Council to give a high rate of priority to a scheme for such a road. By February 1964, however, they received a report of a special sub-committee appointed to consider ways and means of bringing pressure to bear on the Ministry of Transport to ensure that urgently required motorway and major improvement schemes are carried out as soon as possible. In the category headed Motorway projects not included in a Ministry [of Transport] programme, the sub-committee put, as first priority, the Aintree-Skelmersdale Link to M6 which, they stated, was 12 miles long and estimated to cost 10.000,000. The report indicated a downgrading in the perceived importance of the Liverpool-Preston Motorway. Having recognised the impending New Town, it went on; The distance between Aintree and Samlesbury Bridge [the A59/M6 junction east of Preston] by the existing road through Ormskirk [A59] is 26 miles and, via the Motorway Link and the M6, 28 miles. It is felt that through traffic from Liverpool to Preston and beyond would use this Motorway Link in lieu of the existing road and its construction, therefore, would not only be of benefit to North-East Lancashire and North Lancashire but [also] to through traffic from Ormskirk, Burscough and Preston. In addition it would provide a connection between Skelmersdale New Town and Liverpool. That part of the link between M6 and the New Town is already in the Ministry programme. (length 1.8 miles)
Not for the first time, the Committee proposed a deputation to the Minister and, also not for the first time, they had to be content with a meeting with the Permanent Secretary.
The deputation reported back in May 1964. One doesnt need too much insight into the Civil Service mind to anticipate their report. They had been told that programmes were settled up to 1967/68 and were in the process of being rolled-forward to 1968/69. In addition, Sir Humphrey[10] said, the composition and timing of the programme for the first thousand miles of motorway was settled for the next few years. On the Aintree-Skelmersdale Motorway Link to M6, a small sop was thrown to them in the following terms: A comprehensive survey to be prepared on Trunk Road requirements between Liverpool and Preston. This will enable [the Ministry] to take a decision in principle and to consider what survey work should be put in hand. (Clearly the comprehensive survey proposed did not amount to an actual survey that would be too much to hope for!) The Permanent Secretary agreed this on the clear understanding that the Ministry were not committed to any programme date.
The County Councils decision to press ahead with those parts of the M58 covered by the description Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass was vindicated when one carriageway of the road from the eastern edge of the New Town area was approved by the Ministry for financial support and included in the rolling programme of major classified road improvements for 1965-68. In 1964 the Regional Road was similarly accepted as a potential Class I road[11]. The Regional Road was defined as that section of the Aintree-Skelmersdale-M6 Motorway lying within the designated area of the New Town. The New Town Development Corporation agreed to carry the Ministrys share of the cost though this, of course, only determined which central government pocket it came out of as the New Town was funded by central government. No hint of the prolonged and difficult cost-sharing negotiations yet to come was evident in the records of this period. All appeared in order when, in January 1965, the Committee resolved to proceed with a Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) for land between the New Town and M6. The Development Corporation, it was said, would provide the land required for the road within the designated area of the New Town.
The County Councils current preference for the M58/M6 route between Liverpool and Preston was stressed in their response to the Lancashire and Merseyside Industrial Development Associations request for improvements to the A59. Their reply, while not ruling out the direct route roughly following the line of A59, emphasised the benefits which would flow from the route via Skelmersdale.
In the autumn of 1965, one of the all too frequent hiccups in central government funding of roadworks occurred. All major road schemes, with certain restricted exceptions, were put on hold. Fortunately this doesnt seem to have affected the works around Skelmersdale. In October, the Committee approved the plans of the Regional Road for submission to the Ministry at a total estimated cost of 1,992,700 of which 453,000 was for bridges. A two lane single carriageway was to be initially provided, connected, at its western end, to the B5192. The intention was to put the work out to selective tender roundabout mid November. This was one of the first uses, if not the first, of the selective tender method in Lancashire. A list of contractors, capable of carrying out the work, was drawn up and six or seven were chosen to tender. On the whole, this system was favoured by contractors as it reduced the amount of abortive work which went into tendering and gave them a one in six or seven chance of success in those contracts for which they tendered.
In November agreement was reported as having been reached with the Development Corporation on the design and financing of classified roads within the New Town. Under it, the County Council would design all Class I roads and the Development Corporation would design Class II and III roads with the Corporation funding 70% of the cost of all classified roads but unfortunately, as the reader will learn, this was not the end of the story.
It is necessary, at this point in the chronology, to explain another variation in nomenclature which occurred. In approving a design for the Regional Road and resolving to proceed with the stopping-up of various existing roads, the Committee report referred to Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass Section 1. In some subsequent reports, the section from the eastern boundary of the New Town to the M6 became Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass Section 2.
Construction Starts
By the end of the year, 11 contractors had applied to be allowed to tender for the Regional Road, or Section 1 of the By Pass, and 7 were selected. Three months later the tender of the Sir Alfred MacAlpine Ltd/Leonard Fairclough Ltd Consortium in the sum of 1, 857,035 2s 3d (how precise!) was accepted and the County Surveyor was authorised to negotiate a price for the connection of the road to the M6 and into the New Town with the successful tenderer. In the event completely new contracts for Section 2 and for Glenburn Road, one of the connections to the New Town, were drawn up. To have added contracts worth about 3 million to one of less than 2 million without further tendering would have been, to say the least, unwise.
Things now moved fairly quickly. Later in 1966, the Ministry agreed the acceptance of the tender and suggested, very reasonably, that a link to the A577 at Orrell should be built at the same time as the By Pass. The Committee agreed to proceed with the conversion to dual carriageway of the Regional Road and again authorised price negotiation with the Consortium. They also approved the scheme for Section 2, the length from Pimbo Lane to the M6 as a two-lane dual carriageway, including the M6 junction and its roundabouts and the single carriageway Orrell link at an estimated cost of 1,784,525. It was submitted for grant to the Ministry who informed them that grant should be available in the financial year 1966-7. The approved scheme included sufficient land for widening to three lanes on each main carriageway.
In 1967, the North Western Road Construction Unit (NWRCU) of the Ministry of Transport, the first of the regional units, was formed in Preston with the then County Surveyor and Bridgemaster of Lancashire seconded by the County Council as its first Director. Until then, it had been normal for the County Surveyors Department to design and supervise the construction of trunk roads including trunk road motorways in the Lancashire. From this time onwards, although the Lancashire Sub Unit was co-located with the County Surveyors Department and was staffed by County Council personnel on secondment, this change greatly reduced the input of the County Council to trunk motorway and other large trunk road schemes. It also made the task of the historian rather more difficult because references to such road proposals in the Committee minutes become, from this point, fewer and less precise, concentrating more on attempts to influence the government of the day. Promotional evangelism was always a prominent part of the Committees role but now increasingly became almost their only involvement in proposed trunk roads. Also, the civil service culture was, and still is to some extent, more secretive (and also, apparently, more careless with its records) than that of the County Council and information twenty or more years old from government sources is difficult to locate.
Despite the apparent agreement on cost sharing, previously mentioned, between the County Council and the Development Corporation and reported to the Committee in November 1965, by February 1967 there was still nothing signed and sealed. Indeed discussions continued far after agreement was reported as having been reached on the 70/30 basis. To summarise the new agreement, the County Council was to fund the construction of all principal roads including land costs (estimated at 4.69m) and the Development Corporation would fund land and construction costs for all non-principal classified roads (4.974m). The County Council expected to receive government grant of 75% on its share of the cost making its estimated nett contribution 1.172m. This agreement considerably reduced the New Towns contribution and maximised the government grant available to the County Council. No doubt all involved in the discussions convinced themselves that they had won but, surely, the total cost was the same. If, say, the County Council had a reduced share, then the amount paid by central government from one pocket or another must have increased. Add to that the considerable extra cost of the pay and expenses of civil servants and local government officers over the three or more years which the discussions occupied and the whole business seems to me to have been an exercise in futility of which no rational person could possibly be proud.
Believe it or not, that was not the end of the financial problems. As late as May 1975, it was reported to the Committee that the government grant for land costs for Stage 1 of the Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass had been withheld by the government pending agreement with the Development Corporation. There had been protracted negotiations between the Ministries of Transport and Housing and Local Government and, finally, agreement had been reached. The County Council would have to pay interest on the cost from 16th May 1966 to the date of completion. It was mid 1976 before the Department of the Environment brought out their long awaited Circular 53/76 which gave guidance on financing capital expenditure on transport in New Town areas. Despite this, discussions rumbled on at least into 1977. Words (almost) fail me!
The Committees preference for the M58-M6 route from Liverpool to Preston had clearly hardened by September 1967 when approached for support yet again by the West Lancashire RDC to promote the route along A59 and by Bootle Corporation who favoured the M58-M6 option. The report to Committee stated It is felt that the Northern link to M6 [M58] when constructed will give very substantial relief to the existing A59. So far in this account, reference has been made in a number of places to the proposal for a Liverpool-Preston motorway or for a substantial improvement of the A59 trunk road between the two. By 1974, it was acknowledged that such a route would start from a junction on M58 at Bickerstaffe and that the M58 between Aintree and Bickerstaffe would form the first part of a by pass of Maghull and Ormskirk. Having explained what I believe to be the inter-dependence of the Liverpool- Preston [A59] route and M58, it would be wrong to devote much more space to the former in an account whose subject is the latter. However, in December 1975, the DoE went out to consultation on A59 Bickerstaffe-Bretherton. Only a two-lane single carriageway was proposed but it would be upgradeable to a dual carriageway which would be required by traffic conditions by the mid 1990s. The County Council, by and large, supported the proposals. In mid 1986, the Department published Draft Scheme, Side Road and Compulsory Purchase Orders for an A59 Burscough and Rufford By Pass and a public inquiry started on 16th September. Though the County Council supported the scheme, they lodged a holding objection to the side road orders because of difficulties in providing access to an industrial estate on the former Fleet Air Arm airfield, HMS Ringtail, at Burscough. The DTp were insisting on a contribution of over 300,000 from one or all of the local authorities a commitment which the County Council could not accept without some indication of grant from some source. A year later, the Secretary of State decided that the proposals should not be abandoned though the present Orders will be withdrawn pending further consideration. The further consideration involved a traffic study of the Southport/Ormskirk area. The government paper, Policy for Roads in England 1987, published in February 1988 still contained the Burscough By Pass but it was regarded as suspended. The paper also discontinued what was referred to as a Residual Suspended List and which had hitherto included various schemes between Bickerstaffe and M6 at Preston. Thus the last remnants of the Liverpool-Preston motorway vanished from a government programme, at least for the time being.
The Committee were often receiving requests from local authorities for support for one cause or another. In 1967, the Ministry had added Skelmersdale to the list of approved destinations for inclusion on primary route signs. The local authority for the area, based on two old villages, had recently been renamed Skelmersdale and Holland Urban District Council and they wanted Skelmersdale and Holland in full on the signs. Though it must have seemed a rather forlorn, and potentially confusing, idea, the County Council did agree to support the request but it was probably not surprised when, after five months for thought, the Ministry, quite reasonably in my opinion, refused[12].
In September 1967, the Committee were told that the CPO had been confirmed for the Pimbo Lane to M6 section and that government grant was expected very soon so they gave a sub-committee powers to act on selection of tenderers. Seven contractors asked to be allowed to tender and six were selected. Using abbreviated titles, they were R M Douglas, Dowsett, Peter Lind, Robert Macgregor, A Monk and a consortium of Sir Alfred McAlpine and Leonard Fairclough. In the following May tenders had still not been invited because the Ministry was funding some of the works at the M6 junction and they had not completed the necessary procedures. All six potential tenderers were therefore asked, in view of the passage of time, if they still wished to tender. R M Douglas and Peter Lind asked to be excused and so Buckton and Gleeson were substituted. Finally, in June 1968, it was announced that the tender of Dowsett Engineering Construction Ltd in the sum of 1,993,372 had been accepted. The Ministry refused a request from the County Council for 100% grant for this length of road as a potential trunk road though, of course, it was eligible for grant as a potential principal road. The Ministrys refusal in such cases was discussed earlier on page 10.
It was always envisaged that this length of road would, at some time, be upgraded and so, although built as a dual two-lane all-purpose road, an extruded asphalt kerb was provided at the outer edges of the carriageways to facilitate the eventual widening to three lanes and the addition of hard shoulders. The extruded kerb, laid on the upper surface, was required because, in common with most Lancashire-designed motorways, positive drainage was provided. Not for Lancashire the rather cheap, usually imprecise and short-term option of allowing the surface water to run off and hoping it would find its own way, in its own time, to some drain or other! Global warming may highlight the short-sightedness of trying to save money by abandoning positive drainage.
Two bridges were required at the crossing of minor roads. The most significant, Moor Road Bridge, had a deck slab of 9 inch thick reinforced concrete supported by six 8 feet deep girders spanning 158 feet. At the junction with M6, the Winstanley Park Railway Bridge, carrying the motorway over what was then the Wigan (Wallgate) to Liverpool (Exchange) railway line[13], had to be widened to take the junction slip roads. Four old mineshafts were encountered on this length of road. The maximum depth was some 240 feet and, although they had been filled in by the original mine owners, it was necessary to cement-grout the shafts to fill any voids before they were capped.
It was January 1970 before the Orrell link could be added to the Pimbo Lane to M6 contract and the Chairman and Vice Chairman were authorised to negotiate a price with the successful contractor. They agreed a price with Dowsett of 91,312 which increased the estimate for the job as a whole to 2,002,560, an increase of 36,153.
It had long been realised that the tender procedure could be further simplified and, in February 1969, long lists of potential tenderers, grouped by type and value of contract from which the six or seven invitees could be selected, were agreed by the Committee. This avoided the need for approval of selected contractors for each job.
At the end of 1970, approval was given to the dualling of the Aintree-Skelmersdale-M6-M61 Motorway Road[14] from Glenburn Road to Pimbo Lane at an estimated cost of 462,542, increased later to 545,340. The Chairman and Vice Chairman were authorised in July 1971 to accept the lowest tender for the work subject to the County Council receiving 100% grant from the Department.
As there seemed no immediate prospect of motorway status, the Committee resolved to make a Clearway Order in order to prevent vehicles stopping on both the Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass and the Orrell link in May 1971. There had previously been objections to this course of action from Orrell UDC but these had been overcome by the County Councils promise to build a footbridge over the Orrell link.
Perhaps the pursuit of a Clearway Order concentrated minds because, in October 1971, it was reported that the Secretary of State had published his intention to make a number of schemes to facilitate the construction of the M58 from Aintree to Skelmersdale. The Committee raised no objection but asked for special care to be taken with landscaping, particularly near property in Maghull and asked to be consulted during design. The Committee obviously felt that they should deal with their bit. They expressed an intention to make it a Special Road[15] but the Director of the North Western RCU said that the Department would include it with the western section. One senses a certain reluctance on the part of the County Council even though they agreed but they expressed concern at the fact that the Orrell link and the roundabouts at the junction with M6 would not be included. In fact, the situation in 2000 is that the Orrell link and the entire M58/M6 junction including the roundabouts are designated as motorways; the sign at the entrance to the link from the A577 covers both M58 and M6. A footway on the north side of the M58 carriageway linking the two roundabouts under Edgewood Hall Bridge has been fenced off from the remainder of the road to enable the road to become a motorway. Clearly something will have to change at this location if the extension to M61 is built as an all-purpose road if, indeed, it is ever built.
In April 1972 the County Council agreed to the Secretary of State for the Environment[16] making a scheme closing certain temporary link roads and public footpaths in connection with raising the status of the recently constructed Skelmersdale New Town Regional Road to that of a Motorway. These schemes came into effect on 11th April and, on the 26th August all the elements of what had been built as a Principal Road for which the County Council were the Highway Authority were transferred to the Secretary of State and the County Councils direct interest in M58 as highway authority was ended.
A draft Scheme Order for Aintree-Skelmersdale was advertised in September 1971, draft Side Road Orders a year later and, in January 1973, the draft Compulsory Service Order was advertised. The DoE announced that they would hold a Public Inquiry on 11th September 1973 into the Line, Side Road, and Compulsory Purchase Orders and, at the Inquiry, the County Council pressed for speedy action. In July 1974, it became obvious that there was a snag when the County Council received a copy of the Secretary of States decision letter together with a copy of the Inspectors report. It called for further evidence to be heard[17]. So, almost exactly twelve months after the first Inquiry began, to give, it was said, the objectors time to make further submissions, it was re-opened. No one questioned the need for the road; the arguments raged around its location at the western end. The areas of contention included the vicinity of the crossing of the Leeds-Liverpool Canal to the east of Maghull where the effect on nearby properties caused much local concern and, in the vicinity of the first junction on the motorway, where there was a high security prison[18]. The prison authorities were concerned that the presence of the motorway would provide a good escape route for absconding inmates. Despite these problems, in July 1975, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary announced that the Secretary of State had confirmed the various Orders. The Inspector had made a number of recommendations and most were accepted but, on the grounds of extra cost and the effect on agricultural land, his recommendation for an alternative route at Melling had been over-ruled. It was expected that construction work could start in summer 1976.
Unfortunately, another period of financial restriction soon intervened. Tenders for the construction of the Aintree-Skelmersdale section of M58 had already been invited when, in September 1976, M58 (and incidentally, Stage 1 of what was now referred to as the Bickerstaffe-Bretherton improvement of A59) was included in a government announcement under the heading of schemes likely to be delayed, i.e. set back because of expenditure constraints by 1-2 years. In the case of M58 that gave an approximate start year of 1978. Tenders, therefore, could not be accepted. Restrictions had been lifted by March 1978 when it was reported that two contracts had been awarded by the Department of Transport to the Sir Alfred MacAlpine and Son Ltd/Leonard Fairclough Ltd Consortium. The first, logically known as Contract 1, from Aintree to the Merseyside/Lancashire county boundary, was valued at 12,110,965. The second, superficially rather less logically known as Contract 3, from the county boundary to Skelmersdale, was valued at 9,669,508. The report to Committee described the work as Construction of approximately 13km of dual 2 and 3 lane carriageways together with the upgrading of about 1km of the existing Skelmersdale New Town Regional Road and the construction of 27 bridges. Work is to start on 3rd April 1978 and the contract period is 24 months.The scheme has been prepared by the County Surveyor in his capacity as Chief Engineer of the Lancashire County Sub Unit of the North Western Road Construction Unit and he will also be responsible for the supervision of its construction. Contract 2, to complete the numbering, was the contract let by the Department for the upgrading to dual three lane motorway standards of the remainder of the road from west of Skelmersdale to M6. The illogical-seeming sequence of contract numbers came about because of the split of the Aintree-Skelmersdale job into two contracts after Contract 2 had been prepared.
It may be of interest to consider briefly the physical division of the Aintree-Skelmersdale contracts. The original tender documents were drawn up on the basis of a single contract. However, when they saw that the total price exceeded 20m, the Department of Transport or the Treasury (or both) got cold feet and decided to divide the work into two contracts, numbered 1 and 3 and the county boundary came conveniently near the middle. Another justification for the point of division was the need to provide for a major drainage outfall for contract 3, the eastern contract, and Cunscough Brook, approximately the boundary, was suitable to take the flow. The two contracts were let as separate free-standing contracts both, of course, won by one firm, the Consortium. This led to an interesting earthworks situation in which material which had been classified as marginally unsuitable for use as fill on one contract was, instead of being taken to tip, taken to the other contract. On arrival it was placed and intermixed with other imported material and paid for as suitable imported material. Thus the contractor, instead of having to find or provide a tip for the material, was paid for it at an enhanced rate. I have heard it said that, having found that one contractor had got both contracts, the Department should have re-billed the work to avoid such problems but I cannot see any way in which this could have been done without considerable expense for the Department. No contractor voluntarily gives money away without some quid pro quo and the original Treasury-led mistake when they divided the work into two could not have been totally undone.
The two contracts included the construction or alteration of 27 bridges mostly with prestressed concrete decks. Apart from crossing side roads and minor watercourses, other bridges were required to carry the motorway over the Leeds and Liverpool Canal and a slip road over the River Alt as well as the most significant structure which carried what was then the Liverpool (Exchange)-Walton Junction-Preston railway line[19] over the motorway and slip road. This bridge, Wood Hall Railway Bridge, has three continuous skew spans of about 130 feet, 90 feet and 135 feet. It was designed, and its construction was supervised, by the British Railways Board.
The River Alt involved a major diversion in both culvert and open channel. The former consisted of a reinforced concrete structure some 500 feet long. To facilitate drainage in this generally flat part of Lancashire, some significant conduits were needed. A thrust bore was driven beneath the railway line to accommodate a 42 inch diameter pipe (referred to as 1050mm in other sources); a coffer-dam crossing of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal facilitated the construction of a culvert and a drainage outfall.
On the work as a whole, the addition of the third lane to the two lane sections between Glenburn Road and M6 revealed some uncomfortable carriageway levels. These were brought about because, on the original Regional Road, the widening took place outside the original carriageway whereas, on the newer section between Stannanought Road and M6 sufficient width had been provided in the central reservation to allow an extra lane on each carriageway within it. At the joint where the two lengths met, some juggling of levels was required. A case, I suspect, for what is referred to in Lancashire as rack o th eye. The practise of the County Council in obtaining planning permission for a new road greatly simplified the widening process.
Before this, at a late stage of Contract 2, it became apparent that there was a section of carriageway with less than satisfactory riding quality. There is always a dilemma in such cases because it is extremely difficult to inlay a section of surfacing to the same standard as, or better quality than, the original. A site discussion with the Director of the NWRCU resulted in a decision to leave the surfacing unaltered but a significant attitude on the part of the Department was revealed. The Director reiterated his view, reflecting the lukewarm attitude of the Department, that the overall design of M58 between Aintree and M6 was not justified; certainly not as a dual three-lane carriageway. Just as conspiracy theories spring readily to mind so, I fear, do feelings that the views of the Treasury are behind many such attitudes. However that may be, at a late stage in the preparation of contract documents for Contract 1, the Lancashire County Sub-Unit was instructed to reduce the carriageway widths to dual two lane between the Maghull Lane uni-directional junction and the western end of the motorway while still allowing space for three lanes within the motorway boundaries. This decision did not look particularly logical at the time and looks no better now although it is indisputable that traffic, on the motorway as a whole, does not reach levels which would currently justify a dual three lane layout.
The County Council already maintained the length of road from Glenburn Road to M6 and they agreed to accept the responsibility for the maintenance of the length from Aintree to Glenburn Road as agents of the Department. To help in this task, they were invited to design and supervise the construction of a maintenance compound at Glenburn Road. The total length of the M58 ran through three counties, Lancashire, Merseyside and Greater Manchester, any one of which, or, indeed, all three had the capability of carrying out motorway maintenance but it was always sensible to give the responsibility to Lancashire in this case. Unfortunately the same deference to logic did not apply to policing in cases where motorways crossed county boundaries. Whenever it seemed sensible that one force should police across boundaries, objections were often made, usually on the grounds that it would cause difficulties for police personnel attending foreign courts. I would have thought that these problems were not insuperable and that protection of fiefdoms played a considerable part in determining the attitudes of certain Chief Constables.
It had been decided by the Department that only certain lengths of the Aintree-Skelmersdale section of M58 should be illuminated. The County Council were invited to design schemes to light a) the Maghull interchange and the motorway from there to a point 850m east of the Liverpool-Ormskirk railway line and b) the Glenburn Road junction. This was later (December 1975) extended to include the length of motorway from Glenburn Road to M6 and to include communications and sign lighting for the whole motorway. Later still, in December 1980 after the motorway opened, the County Surveyor expressed his concern that the junction of M58 with A570 remained unlit and a number of accidents had been reported. As both roads were trunk roads the County Council could do nothing unilaterally. To remedy the situation, the NWRCU invited the County Council to prepare a scheme for the junction and for upgrading the lighting between there and the nearby roundabout at Four Lane Ends, Bickerstaffe.
The opening of the motorway was distinctly low key and there was more than a hint of something odd in the report to the County Councils Highways and Transportation Committee at their meeting in July 1980.
On 1st June 1980 the section of the M58 motorway between Glenburn Road, Skelmersdale and the A570 Trunk Road Rainford By Pass Junction was opened fully to traffic as a dual three lane motorway. Traffic had already been using this section of motorway for some time as a dual carriageway all-purpose road. The Orders making this section into a motorway were operative from 1st June 1980. The remaining length of the motorway is expected to open to traffic for its entire length through to A59 Switch Island, Maghull during August 1980 but it is not possible to give a precise date at this stage.
Two unresolved issues are raised by this report.
Firstly, whats all this about the Orders? Throughout the scheme there seemed to be a lack of urgency on the part of the Department in the preparation and processing of Orders. This was evident at the time of the Public Inquiry referred to earlier on page 16. I am told that there was also a mix up in the section of the RCU HQ responsible for Orders but, whatever the truth of the matter, many motorists who had been booked for speeding by Merseyside Police before the Orders came into effect had an unexpected, and undeserved, reprieve. For them, Christmas came very early in 1980!
Secondly, why was the motorway apparently going to open completely some five months after the end of the original contract period? This was hardly typical of motorways built by the MacAlpine/Fairclough Consortium in those days and the job does not appear to have been too difficult from a constructional point of view. I suspected, from previous experience, that the bridge carrying the Liverpool-Southport railway line over the motorway in a strategic position just east of the Aintree end of the motorway might have had something to do with the delay, but apparently not. Very good liaison between the British Railways Board (BRB), who insisted on controlling new bridges carrying railway lines, and the Lancashire Sub Unit (LCSU) of the NWRCU, usually in the person of the Superintending Engineer (Roads), ensured that any potential difficulties were ironed-out. The BRB design and specification were, in this case, incorporated into the main contract but their engineers carried out the supervision of the works. In fact the Consortium was awarded a 4 months extension of time due to adverse ground conditions in the area of the Maythorne Canal Bridge and the adjacent 1050mm thrust-bore. A further reason for delay concerned the large roundabout known variously as Switch Island and Maghull Interchange. When opened to traffic, even without M58, it proved incapable of maintaining acceptable traffic flows. Part-time signals were installed. Later it was found that these were inadequate so full-time signals were eventually installed and the A59 through the roundabout was reinstated[20]. The effect of these difficulties and of the programmed removal of the temporary railway diversion which had been provided to allow work on the railway bridge to be carried out was to deny the Consortium adequate access to complete carriageway work between the canal and the railway.
Eventually all was ready. When the time for opening arrived, there was a Department of Transport ban on opening ceremonies with their rather public display of gratuitous expenditure by the authority and their contractors. Undaunted, the site staff organised their own. Judging by the following two photographs, one taken by Merseyside Police and the other by the Resident Engineer, a good time was had by all on the 21st September 1980.
RE staff and guests on opening day
Photograph taken by the RE whose original caption, unedited, reads as follows:
To the left:- Supt. Eng. (Roads & Bridges) NWRCU HQ Indicating pleasure on the works.
Centre:- R.E. Staff looking forward to a pint.
To the right:- Supt. Eng. (Roads) Lancs.C.C.Sub Unit Indicating bladder trouble.
The proposed extension to M61
In September 1966, the County Surveyor was authorised by the Committee to examine a proposed route for an eastward extension of what was then the about-to-be-constructed Skelmersdale-Upholland By Pass, through the southern fringes of the County Borough of Wigan, to the Manchester-Preston Motorway M61. A bridge had been provided when M61 was constructed to allow for the junction with such a road. As previously stated, this proposed road was, at the time, referred to as Route 225 though the route with that number in the 1949 Road Plan for Lancashire had, in fact, been a link between the centres of Wigan and Bolton.
The County Surveyor had clearly been doing some lobbying when, in July 1967, he reported that the Ministry had asked him, jointly with the Borough Engineer of Wigan, to carry out an appraisal of a possible new East-West Motorway to the South of Wigan. He had, of course, previously been authorised by the Committee to study a proposed route and so a lot of groundwork had already been done. The joint report had been completed in February 1967. Three possible alternative routes were suggested. Line A ran very close to the centre of Wigan, joining the Skelmersdale Regional Road at M6 to the end of the Westhoughton By Pass at Amberswood Common. This route was not really recommended because it involved considerable engineering and planning difficulties and would rapidly become overloaded. Line B linked the same two points using the trackbed of the Pemberton Loop [rail] Line which was expected to close. This route apparently caused unacceptable problems in Ince. Line C, towards which members were being steered, was similar but from the Pemberton Loop Line it ran eastwards alongside existing railways to Amberswood Common. All three routes required completely new links into Wigan. Line C provided the shortest route for through traffic but demanded a greater length of links in view of its relative remoteness from the centre of Wigan. The Committee unsurprisingly accepted Line C as the preferred option subject to further study.
Despite the Ministrys invitation, the proposal for an M6-M61 link had not been included in a government Green Paper on the countrys highway needs published in the spring of 1969 and the Committee resolved to campaign further. In September 1970, the Ministrys response to their pressure was received. It was a categorical No. The Ministry pointed out that there were three of what were described as East-West strategy routes in the Lancashire/Cheshire corridor. They were stated as M62, A580 and M56 and they clearly believed that was enough. Lancashire County Council were not happy!
Following discussions between the chief technical officers of Wigan County Borough, Bolton County Borough and Lancashire County Councils, early in 1971 a working party was set up. It must have seemed wise to them at the time when they invited a senior member of staff of the Regional Controllers Office of the Department of the Environment, which had become the responsible government department for transport, to attend their more important meetings. Their illustrated report was published late in 1972 under the misleading but hopeful title of Mid Lancashire Motorway. Their recommended route essentially followed Line C of the Wigan/Lancashire report of 1967. It was received by the County Councils Highways and Bridges Committee in December 1972 who were told that the estimate was now 19.75m which showed a good return (20.6%) on capital. The findings of the working party were summarised in an insert, clearly produced after the main body of the report. It contained the following paragraph:
The case made for the Mid-Lancashire Motorway is such that it is hoped the justification and need for it is now considered established. IN THIS RESPECT IT IS ENCOURAGING THAT ONLY RECENTLY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE ENVIRONMENT HAVE INCLUDED THE ROUTE AS A PROPOSED TRUNK ROAD IN THEIR CONSULTATIVE PAPERS FOR THE NATIONAL PRIMARY TRUNK ROAD NETWORK FOR THE 1980s.
Unfortunately, the hopes emphasised by the authors by their capitalisation of the last sentence quoted above have not yet been realised.
In 1974, Greater Manchester County Council inherited the responsibility for major highways, other than trunk roads, in the area and continued the campaign. In May 1984 they published a report under the title M58-M61 Link Road (Route 225) in which they reviewed the scheme. Though supporting the route in general as a trunk route, they downgraded the proposal to a two-lane dual carriageway all-purpose trunk road. Incidentally, the report made little reference to the previous history of the scheme merely stating rather inaccurately, in paragraph 7.1, The M58-M61 Link Road, originally proposed by Lancashire County Council as the Mid-Lancashire Motorway, was included in the Consultative Papers for the National Primary Trunk Road Network in the early 1970s. The GMC took steps to protect the recommended route.
By 1989, The Greater Manchester County Council had been dissolved and the Department of the Environment had given way to the Department of Transport as the responsible government department. The chance of trunk road status appeared to be enhanced when the Department, employing Parkman Consulting Engineers, went out to public consultation on proposals for the M6 to M61 Link which was subtitled Wigan, Hindley and Westhoughton Bypass. They put forward three routes, all of which had a common western section from M6 to the point at which the route crossed the A573. This portion of the route, described as the Black Route, essentially followed the original proposals except for the length between A571 and B5238. The Departments consultation paper stated, confusingly, that this length of the protected route had been rejected in favour of the Black route because of its increased impact on industrial and residential propertyand increased cost. Surely that says the opposite of what was intended, or does it?
Three alternatives were proposed for the eastern section. The Brown and Red routes both started off on a common line but the Brown Route then went further north to a new junction on M61 mid way between Junctions 5 and 6. The eastbound carriageway of the Red route went under the M61 and both carriageways then headed south on each side of the M61 to join it and the A58 the present Junction 5 making it rather complex. The Blue route was a radically new proposal, going from the end of the Black route to the south of both Hindley and Westhoughton joining the A6 at Chequerbent and thence, along the A58 to Junction 5 with M61. A58 traffic was taken round the motorway junction to join the A58 to the east of Junction 5 to reduce congestion. There was no steer apparent in the paper but I suppose that, if true consultation is really intended, this must be the case though it may lead to some inaction.
In 1993 Parkmans, again working for the Department of Transport, published an Environmental Statement which gave just one route for the roadthe Blue route. This line was stated as having received most support from the public in the earlier consultation exercise. The adoption of this route, because of the location of its eastern termination, effectively ruled out motorway status. Indeed the non-technical summary of the Statement referred to the route as the A5225 Wigan, Hindley and Westhoughton Bypass. Its nice to see that, with the addition of the prefix 5 to satisfy the national zone-of-origin system of road numbering, the old Road Plan route number has survived for over fifty years even if the route is substantially different. A Public Inquiry took place between October 1994 and February 1995 and the Secretary of State accepted the Inspectors recommendation.
In 1996, however, the scheme was removed from the trunk road programme, the route was protected and the responsibility for the scheme was passed to the local authorities with a request from the Secretary of State that they look at other sources of funding for the road. One, perhaps, may be excused for thinking that it had taken the Department of Transport a long time to pluck up the courage to do what they have long appeared to want to do. They now show signs of wishing to divest themselves of the line protection responsibilities which currently require them to acquire and manage property blighted by the line. The responsibility for future of the road now lies with the metropolitan boroughs of Wigan and Bolton, primarily with the former as the greater length lies within Wigans boundaries. As far as anything is certain in this life, it looks as though the road, if built, will not be a motorway; it might even not rate dual-carriageways. It therefore passes outside the scope of the Motorway Archive and becomes one of those footnotes detailing what might have been.
November 2000
[1] Metropolitan boroughs are unitary authorities similar in functions to, but not identical with, the former County Boroughs. County Borough names were often carried forward to Metropolitan Boroughs though the latter were usually geographically much larger.
[2] This book falls rather short of its comprehensive title but to criticise it over much would cause me to unstable one of my hobbyhorses to the detriment of this narrative. Two fairly minor examples, which involve me personally, will suffice in which the author cannot claim that problems with government files are the cause of the deficiency and which illustrate the superficial way in which he deals with non-Trunk motorways and with the role of local authorities. Firstly, one of his motorway maps shows a motorway numbered A629(M). There is no such road though there is an A627(M). Secondly, and rather more importantly, he perpetuates the myth that part of the A666 in Bolton is a motorway, even giving it a touch of verisimilitude with a spurious designation.
[3] Alphabet Soup, I fear, which would have been made worse had I initialised the Lancashire County Council Sub Unit as LCCSU. In the interests of brevity, I refer to it, henceforth, as the Lancashire Sub Unit or by using the initials LCSU except when quoting directly.
[4] It also included a length of road within the County Borough of Wigan but, regrettably, the unitary authorities have not been, in the main, as diligent in their pursuit of Road Plan proposals (on which they were consulted) as has the County Council.
[5] When the North-South Route, M6, was constructed in 1961-63, a two span underbridge was included at Edgewood Hall, Orrell to allow Route 215 to pass under the motorway.
[6] In mid 1974, the population of the New Town was 38,000 and it was then projected to reach 80,000 by 1990. In the event, the actual population in 1991 was 40,083. It had, in other words, only grown by around 2,000 since 1974 and was still about half the projected size. Subjectively it doesnt seem to have changed much in the last decade nor does there appear to be any reason for substantial further growth.
[7] When Committee is used, unqualified and capitalised, in this text, the Highways and Bridges Committee, or, after April 1974, the Highways and Transportation Committee of the Lancashire County Council is referred to.
[8] Class I roads were those A roads which were not trunk roads. Later most Class I roads were designated Principal Roads. For the purposes of this paper Class I roads and Principal Roads may be considered synonymous.
[9] The use of the words Ministry or Department similarly capitalised and unqualified in this account means the government department responsible for highways whatever its title may have been at the time.
[10] Sir Humphrey Appleby was a fictional Permanent Secretary in the British TV situation comedies Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister in which he regularly demonstrated the black arts by which senior civil servants attempt, apparently with a great deal of success, to manipulate their political masters.
[11] Classified Roads, for which the County Council was the highway authority within the County, were either Class I, II or III and received amounts of central government grant varying from 75% to 30%. The Class I category roughly equates to the present Principal Road.
[12] A little consistency might be in order. Why, I wonder, has the town in Hampshire which most people know as Hamble, recently become, on certain signs, Hamble-le-Rice? Surely signs are intended to inform, not confuse and sign clutter such as this does not help.
[13] This line is now a shadow of its former self, running from Wigan to Kirkby. Through running to Liverpool is not possible and, indeed, Exchange Station no longer exists.
[14] My restraint in not drawing to the readers attention yet another example of eccentricity and tautology in the nomenclature of schemes should earn me some reward. I couldnt, however, resist this footnote.
[15] A Special Road is a legal category of road restricted to certain specified types of traffic and a Motorway is a particular type of Special Road.
[16] The responsible government department veered from Environment to Transport before becoming, at the time of writing, Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR). It was, in the early days, a Ministry and, later, a Department depending on the rank of its political head.
[17] I have it on good authority that the evidence which he required was available to the Inspector at the original Inquiry but that the chief witness for the NWRCU ignored promptings by the Lancashire Sub-Unit representatives and failed to produce it. Unaltered, it satisfied the Inspector when finally produced at the reconvened Inquiry.
[18] Currently known as Ashworth High Security Prison
[19] As previously mentioned, Exchange Station is no more and the line is effectively broken at Ormskirk, preventing through running to Preston.
[20] Later a flyover was provided to enable southbound traffic on A59 to avoid conflict with traffic leaving A59 and going east on M58. The junction is now, in my opinion, what Field Marshal Montgomery used to call a dogs breakfast and the flyover is clearly a rather desperate palliative. It returns A59 traffic to ground level just in time to be crossed by other traffic.