Mersey Gateway bridge axing ‘a gateway to hell’

Mar 12 2009 by Andrew Bowan, Runcorn and Widnes Weekly News

FAILURE to go ahead with the Mersey Gateway bridge would herald a paralysed and stagnated Halton in years to come.

David Parr, Halton Borough Council chief executive, put forward contrasting visions of Halton’s future.

He said that if the second crossing did not happen, 25 years from now Halton would be blighted by congestion, disruption and deprivation.

Motorists would sit in traffic for hours and experience major disruption for weeks or months if the Silver Jubilee bridge closed for repairs.

Traffic would be squeezed through Warrington and the sub-region and it would be a strain on UK Plc, he said.

Should the second crossing go ahead, he envisaged a dramatic stimulus to the local economy with unemployment trimmed to 5%.

And he tantalised the audience with a vision in which Liverpool Airport is bigger than Manchester, 3MG is the “premier freight park” and Widnes Vikings would play world championship rugby against Manly.

After his speech the panel took questions from attendees, including business leaders, councillors, and members of the public.

Cllr Paul Kennedy, of Warrington Borough Council, asked whether Halton would dip into pension funds to tackle any shortfall due to PFI funding problems.

The panel said that Halton Borough Council has no public pension fund to use and that the project is less vulnerable to funding issues because of a Government grant.

Steve Nicholson, Mersey Gateway project director, also said journeys across the Silver Jubilee will be cut from 90,000 to 78,000 - but one inevitable challenge would be increasing car ownership.

Lorraine Robinson, a Runcorn resident, said she was worried that more roads would make it harder for people to travel on foot.

Tony McDermott, Halton Council leader, said the second crossing was essential as the existing bridge was built for 9,000 journeys a day but it now had to cope with 10 times that amount of traffic.