North East roadworks set to be removed over festive period
Nearly 450 miles’ worth of roadworks are to be completed or lifted by Highways England.
In total ninety-eight percent of the agency’s nine and a half thousand-mile network will be free of roadworks, with sixteen sets of roadworks in the north east been completed.
Highways England Operations Director Dave Skupski hopes that by removing the roadworks it will allow people to travel over the Christmas period with as little disruption as possible. He said:
“This Christmas bank holiday, we’re expecting lots of people to be making journeys over the festive period, that’s why we’ve removed a number of road works to create as much capacity as possible.”
Some of the key schemes which will be completed in time for Christmas include the £191 million improvement scheme at Catthorpe junction 19 of the M1. Once finished the scheme will revolutionise the journeys made by more than a hundred thousand vehicles through the area every day.
Dave says that as well as removing the roadworks other measures will also be put in place to ensure that journeys can run as smoothly as possible:
“Our traffic offices will also be on patrol working to clear any incidents; the vast majority of which will be dealt with in under an hour”
However, he urges drivers to be well prepared:
“Make sure you have everything you need for your journey should there be any delays, check before and during your journey and also make sure you’re aware of the signs and signals on the motorways”.
A recent survey found that fifty percent of drivers will be travelling more than fifty miles to visit friends and family over Christmas.
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