History
The first proposal for a road along this route was agreed in 1958 and it entered the Trunk Road Programme for 1967/1968. Construction began in 1968 and the motorway opened in stages between 1971 and 1981:
- Junctions 1 to 3 opened in 1975.
- Junctions 3 to 7 opened in 1972.
- Junctions 7 to 9 opened in 1974.
- Junctions 9 to 11 opened in 1975.
- Junctions 11 to 14 opened in 1971.
- Junctions 14 to 16 opened in 1981.
Proposals existed for an extension into North Wales across the proposed Dee Barrage, but these have not happened.
Until 2008 the M56 terminated at a roundabout at the west end. Work started in 2006 to grade-separate this junction (and others) to allow free-flowing traffic to North Wales. The project was completed in 2008.
Read more about this topic: M56 Motorway
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“For a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)
“We know only a single science, the science of history. One can look at history from two sides and divide it into the history of nature and the history of men. However, the two sides are not to be divided off; as long as men exist the history of nature and the history of men are mutually conditioned.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“Man watches his history on the screen with apathy and an occasional passing flicker of horror or indignation.”
—Conor Cruise O’Brien (b. 1917)