Cuerden embankment, view west, 10 January 1996
Cuerden embankment, view west (see all photos of the same view)
The huge embankment at Cuerden, at the top of the picture, is visible here along with the borrow pit that was formed just to the south, where material to build it was excavated. In the cutting on the right, the slopes have been seeded with grass.
Structure 4/4a/4c (M6 interchange bridges)
What's new
The monster seen from below
What might it have been like to stand in one spot and witness the arrival, and the uncertainty, of plans for an urban motorway in West London?
The road that made no sense
It was the UK's only single-carriageway motorway, and twenty years ago it ceased to exist. This is the story of the strange fascination it held, and of my place in history.
The forever bottleneck, part 2
The second part of the story, where we learn why exactly the M4 gets narrower on the final approach to Europe’s biggest city.
Have you seen...
Sir James Drake
County Surveyor and Bridgemaster for Lancashire in the 1950s and 60s, Drake was instrumental in the motorway revolution.
