Residents have had their say on one of Bolton’s biggest road schemes which aims to tackle congestion at a major junction.

Proposals have been drawn up for the £23million De Havilland Way scheme with the consultation having closed on Friday.

The scheme has been designed as part of the government’s £50m Levelling Up Fund and is designed to ease congestion for cars and buses at peak times, as well as to improve walking and cycling facilities and create a better-connected network that can accommodate future growth.

Under the plans, roundabouts in the area will be improved by adding a traffic light system to ease congestion at peak times.

The roundabouts which will have signalised junctions include Beehive Roundabout, the Spirit of Sport Roundabout, the A6 De Havilland Way Roundabout and at Junction 6 of the M61.

Potential changes are also being proposed to Austin’s Lane to support the movement of traffic as part of the revised Beehive Junction.

Residents were invited to have their says to help shape the proposals.

Local councillor Sue Baines, who is also the Executive Cabinet Member for Health and Wellbeing at Bolton Council said there has been positive feedback for the project.

She said: “Local people have been voicing their dissatisfaction and frustration about congestion and journey times on Chorley New Road, around the Beehive roundabout and on De Havilland Way and the A6 for a long period of time now.

“It can be stressful and from my personal experience using this route regularly, it can often take well over half an hour to get from the first roundabout to the motorway depending on the time of day I travel.

“Sometimes it’s been a lot longer.

“This area links with travel to and from Blackrod, Westhoughton and across the borough and a better system is required.

“The health and well-being of residents is also a factor and there is a need to promote active travel, so there needs to be safety for those who wish to walk or cycle around this highway corridor.

“The council can apply for Government funding up to £50million pounds and this improvement scheme will cost around £23million.

“The council and associated officers have engaged with the public via the internet, leaflets and at an event held this week at Horwich RMI club on Chorley New Road.

“Getting the views of residents is extremely important and on the whole, from those people I have spoken with, there is positivity for the project and officers are listening to concerns and ideas and some changes are already being considered.”

Cllr Marie Brady, councillor for Horwich Northeast has shared her views on the consultation and the bid for improvements to De Havilland Way.

She said: "I'm not in favour of the one-way system up Austin's Lane coming down Crompton Road.

"I don't really think that most certainly for the residents of Crompton Road, it would be very unpleasant, forcing all traffic to come down there and there are some quite large vehicles that go up to the school.

"There is a coach that goes up there that I'm aware of, so I think that that would cause difficulties but certainly for the intentions that were explained to councillors, traffic light signals all the way through would improve the journey times and the congestion at peak times which is where there is a real problem.

"We have got a lot more traffic on the roads generally but with new housing developments as well, it's good to see some a form of intervention being taken now rather than waiting for it to happen and become even more of a problem.

"It's important that as many people as possible do put forward their comments.

"The option for Austin's Lane I'm not particularly happy with, certainly if I lived there, I wouldn't be happy at all, but I think that the concept along De Havilland Way is good because there's not just traffic from Horwich, it's from Bolton to join the M61 as well and also traffic from Westhoughton."