Press Release
Tuesday 5 April 2016
Weston Link ‘loop' slip road to Southern Expressway to close permanently from 11 April
The ‘loop' slip road that connects the eastbound Weston Link to the eastbound Southern Expressway, heading towards Preston Brook, will close permanently from Monday 11 April.
Asigned diversionwill be in place until the summer of 2016, taking traffic north along the Central Expressway before heading round the eastern side of Runcorn Shopping Centre, past Halton General Hospital and rejoining the Southern Expressway at the Hallwood Link Road roundabout.
The ‘loop' slip road due for demolition is part of the Lodge Lane Junction, which is being modified to provide a primary access route between the M56 Junction 12 and the Mersey Gateway bridge. This will remove the existing tight bends and create a freeflowing approach to the new crossing.
At the same time, the Mersey Gateway team will re-open the slip road from Weston Link to Central Expressway northbound. When this route reopens, traffic will be diverted via Halton Lea junction and back onto the C Expressway, until further notice.
Once work in this part of the route is complete this summer thefinal route for driverslooking to travel from Weston Link on to the Southern Expressway towards Preston Brook will be to head north alongside the Central Expressway before turning at the Halton Lea junction and rejoining the Southern Expressway.
Hugh, O'Connor, General Manager for Merseylink, said: "Whilst this is a major piece of highway infrastructure that we are removing to build a more effective road network for the future, this route is actually not used by very many drivers, so we hope there will not be any major issues caused by the diversion."
He added: "However, we do recognise that there wil be some drivers who will be inconvenienced, and as ever I'd like to urge people to drive safely and allow extra time to reach their destination if this diversion does affect them."
Drivers can keep up to date with traffic management issues around Widnes and Runcorn by watching out for new alerts on road signage and social media, or by visiting theDown Your Street sectionon the Mersey Gateway website.
The economic, transport and social benefits the project will bring to the region include:
470 permanent full-time equivalent jobs on site during construction
4,640 permanent direct and indirect jobs
£61.9 million a year in Gross Value Added from the new jobs by 2030.
When it opens in 2017, both the new bridge and the Silver Jubilee Bridge will be tolled, but they will be free* to Halton residents.
Ends
For further information please contact Chris Taylor or Karen Westcott at DTW on 01287 610 404 / 07949 287 356 / 07545 210 067 or emailchris@dtw.co.ukorkaren@dtw.co.uk.
Editors Notes:
About the project
The Mersey Gateway Project will be one of the largest infrastructure initiatives in the UK over the coming years. The Mersey Gateway Project has been identified as one of the UK government's Top 40 priority projects in theNational Infrastructure Planand it has been recognised by KPMG as one ofthe‘Top 100 infrastructure projects around the globe'.
Its features will include:
a 1,000m long cable stay bridge consisting of four spans supported from three towers in the estuary;
a unique design where the 80m high central tower will be shorter than the two outer towers, which will be 110m (north tower) and 125m (south tower) ;
a total length (including the bridge and approach viaducts) of 2.13km;
a deck carrying six lanes of traffic (three in each direction) with a speed limit of 60mph;
up to 30 supporting piers carrying it across the approach viaducts; and
a curved approach at each end of the bridge giving varying views of its unique design and maximising its visual impact.
*Residents of Halton will still need to register to use the bridges and there will be a small charge for this.
You can find out more about the project atwww.merseygateway.co.uk.
About the Merseylink consortium
The Merseylink Consortium was appointed by Halton Borough Council as the project company in 2014, on a 30-year contract to design, build, finance and operate the project.
Its equity partners are Macquarie Capital Group Limited, BBGI, and FCC Construcción. The construction joint venture is made up of Kier Infrastructure and Overseas Limited, Samsung C&T Corporation and FCC Construcción S.A.
Sanef S.A. will deliver and operate the tolling solution for the consortium.