West Midlands business shuns M6 Toll on cost

BUSINESSES across the West Midlands are shunning the M6 Toll because it is too expensive, a major survey has revealed.

Birmingham Chamber of Commerce Group, which also includes Solihull, Cannock Chase, Lichfield, Tamworth and Burton chambers, said its members would prefer to use existing routes rather than pay for the congestion-free option.

The survey revealed that none of the businesses questioned used the motorway on a daily basis, and the vast majority (78.2%) said price was the main reason they did not use it.

Car drivers are charged £5 for a one-way trip along the 27-mile route, while HGVs pay double that.

Ironically, latest figures show usage of the road increased by more than 5% during the July to September quarter, although daily volumes are only around 44,000 vehicles.

The chamber survey, which took in the views of more than 100 businesses, was conducted ahead of the announcement by the Government that urgent work is to be undertaken to widen the M6 motorway at Castle Bromwich, as part of a £600m package of transport improvement schemes. The Department of Transport has also announced it is to review a link road between the M6 Toll and the M54.

Of the members which did use the road, 13.4% said they had used the motorway at some point and had done so because of road closures and roadworks.

The survey found that 38.9% of those polled never use the road, and only 27.8% use it on anything like a regular basis. Nearly a third of those surveyed said they use the road only occasionally.

Since March of this year, the majority (57.4%) said their usage remained unchanged, while nearly a third (29.6%) said they were using the road less.

Of the latter, most (56.3%) said the reason for not using the road was down to cost.

Despite this, of the businesses which did use the road regularly, 53.3% said they felt the time saved justified the price.

Will Rogers, chamber policy adviser, said: “It’s good to see that there has been an overall growth in the usage of the Toll Road since 2009.

“However, many people still feel that the road is too highly priced to provide a viable alternative to the heavily congested M6.

“For regular users, it’s not an economic alternative to the M6 – however, it remains to be seen what will happen once the proposed road widening scheme between Ray Hall and Castle Bromwich is completed.

”That scheme – plus the one currently underway at Wolverhampton – should lead to a reduction in congestion, which could mean there will be less reason to use the Toll Road than there is today.”