Latest News!

The responses to the latest list of questions we raised on behalf of residents (back in February 2025) are available here (responses provided in June 2025). The response to our follow up questions (submitted on 21st July 2025) were provided on 30th October 2025 and are available here.

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February 2025 What local residents should know about the CRR

• The CRR will cost more than £130 million. The figure keeps rising – see below.
• Trafford have said explicitly that the road is not being constructed for the benefit of existing residents: “The key objective of the new Carrington Relief Road is to provide sufficient capacity within the transport network to deliver growth”.
• Trafford say the new road will increase traffic levels: “Traffic flows are likely to increase due to the improved desirability of the route”.
• Residents in all surrounding communities will see an increase in through traffic and more congestion at the junction to the Carrington Spur.
• Carrington Moss is also well used by local residents for walking, cycling and horse riding and, because the air is clean, it provides significant benefits to their health and wellbeing. The construction of this road will cause huge increases in air, noise, light, vibration and water pollution, impacting both human and wildlife populations.
• There is already a road that runs through the employment area, known as the A1, that could be upgraded to reduce the impact of HGVs on Carrington Village.
• The recorded and unrecorded public rights of way across Carrington Moss could be upgraded to provide more cost effective, convenient active travel routes.
• There is no commitment to invest in public transport infrastructure despite there being ‘live’ railway corridors in Carrington and Partington and that Trafford considers the communities surrounding Carrington Moss to be “poorly served” by public transport. The project “does not include a confirmed bus route or planned bus services”.
• Carrington Moss currently captures and stores huge amounts of water. If it is no longer available to support climate mitigation in this way, there is a greater risk of localised flooding in Sale West and other areas.
• There are several examples of the information in the consultation being inaccurate and it is not consistent with the information in the letter that has been sent out to local residents.
• Carrington Moss contains a 335 hectare irreplaceable habitat (peat moss), which is restorable according to Natural England. The land also includes productive Grade 2 agricultural land, woodland and wetland habitats, which are home to many red listed (threatened or protected) bird and wildlife species.
• This land should be preserved to support climate mitigation, nature’s recovery and future food security. It is essential for the health and wellbeing of future generations of both humans and wildlife.

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FOCM Blogs related to the CRR

This is NOT a solution to benefit local residents, find out why – read on and take a look at our previous blogs for more information.
– 11th November 2019 What is Consultation? 
– 20th December 2020 There is a huge problem with suggesting that the New Carrington development will lead to public transport improvements for this area 
– 23rd September 2021 What does Trafford’s latest report on the CRR mean for affected residents 
– 14th October 2021 Presenting our petition to Trafford’s Full Council Meeting 
– 12th February 2022 The CRR is not the only show in town (oh, yes it is!)
– 18th February 2022 How many vehicles can we expect on local roads
– 27th February 2022 Our struggle to secure robust, genuine consultation
– 4th March 2022 A biased and misleading Option Appraisal
– 19th July 2022 Another CRR Report – another list of factual errors and misleading statements! 
– 23rd September 2022 Consultation about the CRR – has it been fully scrutinised
– 17th January 2023 CRR – Trafford continues with their Decide, Announce, Defend approach
– 12th February 2024 Does the New Carrington Transport Strategy Address Resident Priorities
– 8th March 2024 New Carrington Transport Strategy
– 31st March 2024 What will be the true cost of the Carrington Relief Road
– 12th June 2024 Is the Carrington Relief Road really a relief road? 
– 10th October 2024 Concerned about traffic – email your Councillors about the CRR
– 26th November 2024 Unsustainable New Carrington, Trapped Behind the Wheel 
– 29th December 2024 Risk to your local peat moss
– 19th January 2025 Call to Action – CRR Consultation
– 26th January 2025 Call to Action 2 – CRR Walk on the Moss
– 16th March 2025 The Greater Manchester Green Belt Lie 
– 3rd April 2025 Poor Public Transport for the New Carrington Area
– 4th July 2025 Public Money Wasted as Trafford Ignores its own Policies

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The first CRR Consultation January 2025

January 2025 Carrington Relief Road Consultation Opens – the FIRST consultation about the CRR! The costs have now escalated to £130m – we ask which organisation(s) is/are on the hook for any unfunded but committed spend!

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April 2024

On 6th April 2024, we featured in a Manchester Evening News article about the Carrington Relief Road (and Trafford’s insistence that peat is not an issue)!

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March 2024

13th March 2024 Trafford presented a report to Scrutiny Committee about the Carrington Relief Road. We wrote to Scrutiny in advance of the meeting, alerting Scrutiny Committee members to a number of issues – you can find our email here. to  A link to the recording of the Scrutiny Committee meeting (from 47:49 minutes) can be found here and the report is available here.

On 25th March 2024, we received Trafford’s response, within which they state “It is completely misleading to continue to associate the Carrington Relief Road with Peat“. In fact, it is completely misleading to suggest the peat will not be impacted by the road. We sent our response to all Councillors on 29th March 2024, explaining (including with graphics) why Trafford is incorrect.

January 2023

12th January 2023 update: Trafford has updated their webpage about the Carrington Relief Road and has been connecting with organisations about a logo for the initiative (but has held no workshops with, or sent any communications to, communities).

In fact, we have not heard from the CRR team since October 2022 and have had no information about progress in the plans for the Carrington Relief Road, nor the consultation that was supposed to be happening last year.

This is a very poor approach to communicating with communities. 

The Council is continuing with the Decide, Announce, Defend approach (“Once the initial design plans are completed, we will hold a public consultation“) rather than the more appropriate Engage, Deliberate, Decide method, which fully involves communities in design.  Given our experiences to date, we expect that our inputs will be totally ignored.

October 2022

In October 2022 we were finally given access to the formal Walking, Cycling and Horseriding Assessment Report (WCHAR) – access it below in the blue box (under the section headed July 2021, as this report was dated August 2021). This (along with other background documents from the Preferred Option Report) were reviewed (October 2022).

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March 2022

On 9th March 2022, we sent all that information to Trafford’s Scrutiny Committee, copied to all Councillors for information. You can see the short presentation we included here.

Many of our slides link back to further information (including our recent blogs).  If you do not have time to review all of this material, do take a look at links 1 and 2 below.

1. Our review of Trafford’s CRR Option Appraisal
2. Our struggle to secure robust, genuine consultation
3. Traffic Numbers for New Carrington
4. A summary of the GM Transport Strategy 2040 – what is promised for the New Carrington area?
5. A summary of the New Carrington Allocation and Places for Everyone – is green belt release needed?
6. What was promised for Carrington, Partington and Sale West in the 2012 Core Strategy & the 2006 UDP?

The key takeaways are as follows:

• It should be remembered that Places for Everyone has not yet been approved – and it is a 16 year plan from the date of approval, giving time to develop sustainable passenger and freight transport options, for which both Trafford and TfGM should be providing more leadership, especially given that GM’s Transport Strategy suggests that achieving the Right Mix is expected to lead to zero net growth in motor vehicle traffic in Greater Manchester between 2017 and 2040.
• We were surprised to see the costs highlighted as £29.4m in the Executive Report (which is less than the previously reported capital costs of £34m – we’d be amazed if the costs have come down!).  The cost figure mentioned in the Option Appraisal for Option F (route across the Moss) is £36m.  The Option Appraisal makes it clear that many of the costs are excluded from this Option F figure, including the cost of dualling, and there are a number of other costs about which we are unclear whether they are in or out!
• The Public Engagement exercise was limited to raising questions about the CRR and the Option Appraisal process.  It was not a consultation (there were no questions on Trafford’s Consultation Portal and residents were explicitly told it was NOT about proposing preferences regarding the route option).  In addition, most of the questions we submitted were not summarised in the Option Appraisal Report and have not been responded to.  Our requests for workshops have been repeatedly ignored.
• Natural England’s damning response to the consultation was not highlighted in either the Executive Report or in the presentation to Scrutiny Committee (see the attached pack).
• There has been a consistent lack of support for the New Carrington development & CRR proposals from residents, yet no forums have been created so we can provide input.
• Residents believe improvements can be made to the design of Option A and asked (in the Public Engagement exercise) how our ideas can be fed into the process.  NO response was received, yet there could be opportunities to create a solution which would result in lower costs for the public purse, be less environmentally damaging and more acceptable to local residents.

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January 2022
Responding to the CRR presentation to Trafford’s Scrutiny Committee

On 12^th January 2022, the proposals for the Carrington Relief Road were presented to Trafford’s Scrutiny Committee.  You can watch the presentation and the response from members here.  After that presentation, FOCM developed a number of blogs to correct the misinformation, fill the gaps and provide the viewpoint of the KEY stakeholder – Trafford residents. 

Our work culminated in a detailed analysis of the latest Option Appraisal document about the CRR (see below).  It’s a bit of a long read but we did find 17 points of bias, 14 contradictions, 10 inaccuracies, 19 misleading statements and 23 other issues!

October 2021

On 13th October 2021, the Friends of Carrington Moss presented their petition of 1,622 signatures to Full Council, which was followed by a short “debate” during which a representative from each political Party spoke for around 3 minutes, followed by a summing up by Councillor Andrew Western (Leader of Trafford Council).

During the presentation, the Friends group requested a seat at the table in the design of the plans for the area, invited Councillors to consider the genuine alternatives to the Carrington Relief Road and asked for Trafford’s declaration of a climate emergency to be fully taken into consideration. You can read our full presentation here.

You can hear the responses of the Councillors here (fast forward to 13 minutes 55 seconds).

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September 2021

On 27th September 2021, Trafford Council’s Executive Committee approved the route for what they are calling the Carrington Relief Road, despite feedback from Natural England raising significant concerns about the environment impact of this option. This decision did not take any of our questions or concerns (from 8th March, see below) into consideration. You can read our review of the proposals in our blog, here.

July 2021

In early July 2021, we were asked by Trafford/Amey for feedback about the Walking, Cycling and Horseriding implications of the plans for the road. We worked with local Parish Councils and other interested groups such as Peak and Northern Footpaths Society, Ramblers Trafford, horse riding and cycling colleagues to put together the following response, which was submitted on 23rd July 2021. Our documents can be accessed below in the green boxes.

March 2021

The Friends group and representatives from local Parish Councils met with members of the project team on 8th March 2021 to review their priority questions. The input document used at that meeting is available on the button below, the document has used the transcript from the video on the website as a focus for the questions (note that the priority questions, which were raised at the meeting, have been duplicated at the beginning of the document).

February 2021

In February 2021, Trafford made their Carrington Relief Road website available to residents. They commenced an Engagement process (this was not a formal consultation), which allowed residents to raise questions about the Preliminary Options Appraisal document that had been issued and was referenced on the website. There was also an indication of the timescales for the implementation of the road, which suggested that the scheme would open in Autumn 2024.

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January 2021 Options Appraisal Report

Following the decision by the Executive Member for Housing and Regeneration (6th January 2021), Trafford published the Carrington Relief Road Options Report, which set out the options being considered and the planned approach to public consultation. The Preliminary Options Appraisal Report provided more detail about the options and the pros and cons for each.

We encouraged all our members to respond to the consultation (when it begins) and we hope they will object to any routes that suggests the road goes across Carrington Moss. Carrington Parish Council and the Friends of Carrington Moss have proposed a route that takes traffic (particularly HGVs) across the Ship Canal. This would be a much better solution and would support Trafford’s declaration of a climate emergency and their recently published Carbon Neutral Action Plan.

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Outline Business Case (2020)

Back in February 2020, we were very disappointed to read the document Trafford shared on their website (an Executive Summary of the Outline Business Case for the Carrington Relief Road).  There has still been no consultation about the need for this road, never mind the route and there is no recognition in the document about the damage to local ecology and biodiversity, the cost to the health and well-being of local residents and the impact on habitats which are the breeding and feeding grounds of over 20 red listed birds and a number of endangered species, including the water vole. In addition, there is no mention at all about the impact of the huge number of HGVs on the health of local residents and the vibration damage caused to their homes. The Return on Investment does not take any account any of these problems, the environmental losses, nor is there any reference to air or noise pollution for impacted residents. 

We held a public meeting back in February and wrote to Trafford’s Chief Executive about our concerns. We also submitted a number of Freedom of Information Act requests to clarify some of the issues we had raised. There is more information about these actions below.

We then began working with Carrington Parish Council to develop our own Community Focused Transport Strategy for the area and have subsequently presented our proposal to other Parish Councils, businesses and Trafford officers. Having held several public meetings to present our ideas to residents, the document has been much improved following their feedback.

In the meantime, we have been working closely with Carrington Parish Council to develop a Balanced, Community Focused, Transport Strategy for the area and, whilst we are still awaiting the details of Trafford’s planned consultation events about the roads, we have presented our proposal to them and hope that it will form one of the options to be considered.

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Information discussed and presented at the public meeting on 25^th February 2020 is set out below. At the meeting we discussed the contents of the Carrington Relief Road document, the options available to us and agreed our next steps.

We have already been talking to some of the Trafford officers dealing with the plans for the road and they have confirmed that there will be genuine consultation with local residents, which we welcome.

We have asked for more information about the way the project will be structured, the timetable, the communications strategy and the approach for ensuring all risks/issues are captured and mitigated.

The other key issues we raised are set out below:

Many parts of Carrington Moss are subject to regular surface water flooding.  In fact, we have had very high levels of flooding continuously since October 2019, now extending into Dainewell Woods, leading us to recognise a new feature on the Moss, “Carrington Lake”.  Click here to take a look at some of our photos on our feature page.

Residents have a number of ideas aimed at reducing reliance on the car and improving access to the isolated communities in Carrington, Partington and Sale West.

There are a number of Factual Errors and Misleading statements within the Outline Business Case document, which we highlighted in our letter.

Finally, we feel strongly that residents should have sufficient information to enable them to contribute as fully as other key stakeholders, who have clearly been involved in various discussions to date.  With this in mind, a Freedom of Information Act request has been submitted in relation to the Carrington Relief Road and, depending on the information supplied, may need to be repeated for the other parts of the scheme (the Sale West Link Road and the Southern Link Road).  We are hoping for a quick response, especially given the rapid timetable for this programme of work.

We’d like to remind you about some of the other reasons why we will be objecting to the road.