Official Opening of the Birmingham to Preston Motorway M6 by the Rt. Hon. Ernest Marples P.C., M.P., Minister of Transport : Hanchurch to Lymm section : Ministry of Transport - Cheshire County Council - Staffordshire County Council : [Stafford] : 1963 : H

A quite lavish brochure issued to commemorate the opening of the Hanchurch, Staffordshire, to Lymm, Cheshire, section of the M6 motorway that was formally opened by the Minister of Transport, Ernest Marples, on Friday 15 November 1963. Marples, whose tenure as Minister in the Conservative Government, was controversal given his links to the building company Marples Ridgway, was busy at the time as various sections of motorways opened at which he presided.

 

This thirty three mile section of motorway, for which Staffordshire County Council and Cheshire County Council had acted as agents for on behalf of the Ministry of Transport, linked the recently opened Stafford - Hanchurch sections of 1962 in the south and the Lymm to Bamber Bridge section to the north that had opened on 29 July 1963. The main contractors were Scott & Wilson, Kirkpatrick & Partners as consulting civil and structural engineers along with main contractors Tarmac Ltd., on the North Cheshire section, Sir Lindsay Parkinson & Co. Ltd., for the South Cheshire section and John Laing Construction Ltd. for the Staffordshire section. As well as the motorway segregated junctions were constructed with the A556, A54 for Holmes Chapel, A534 for Sandbach and the junction at Barthomley for the eventaul A500 North Potteries link road. Two service stations at Keele and Knutsford were also constructed.

 

The brochure contains facts and figures as well as numerous photographs of construction and completed features. Itw as printed in Stafford by R. W. Hourd & Son Ltd.

 

This image is of a virtually deserted road and is looking north from Howshoots Bridge, at the Lymm interchange, of the section that actually opened in July 1963. You can see the Thelwall Viaduct in the distance and a partially 'scrubbed' line of cones on the southbound carriageway that may have been to funnel traffic off on to the A50 before the section south opened.

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