Local traffic ban on M25 'possible'

First Edition

PART OF the M25 round-London motorway may have to be closed to local traffic unless it is widened, a road lobby organisation suggested yesterday.

The British Road Federation said that parts of the motorway designed to take 120,000 cars a day were having to cope with 200,000 and chaos would ensue on local roads unless proposed improvements were carried out.

Roger Diment, director of the federation, which is funded by road builders, motoring organisations and other road users, said: 'Unless extra capacity - in the short-term widening, and in the long-term building of collector-distributor or link roads - is provided, the motorway cannot continue to meet all of those markets.' A high proportion of cars entering the motorway leave within the next couple of exits and it is this local traffic that would be the target for possible restrictions, he said.

Mr Diment, who described the M25 as a 'great success', added that the local traffic would not disappear but would add to congestion on other roads.

Roger Higman, transport campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said that it was wrong to say that the M25 relieved traffic. 'In fact, the Government's consultants have said that the widening would lead to more traffic on the M25 and the roads around it.'