A57 Sankey Green closes overnight from 10 August for up to eight weeks, changing hospital access. Every current Warrington closure, with dates and diversions.

The big one starting this week is the A57 Sankey Green roundabout, known locally as Pink Eye. From Monday 10 August 2026 the northern side closes in phases for up to eight weeks, overnight only, and the access into Lovely Lane changes. If you drive to Warrington Hospital in the evening, read the phasing below before you set off.

Everything on this page was checked against Warrington Borough Council’s roadworks pages on 9 August 2026. Roadworks move; the sections further down on the swing bridges, the routes that carry the town and station parking do not.

What is closed now

A57 Sankey Green (Pink Eye) roundabout, north side. 10 August to 3 October 2026, closures 7pm to 1am Monday to Friday, all roads open outside those hours. It comes in two phases. Phase 1A (northwest, two to three weeks) closes the access into Lovely Lane, so the hospital cannot be reached that way; the entrance is still open coming south on Lovely Lane or via Priestley Street. Phase 1B (northeast, three to four weeks) closes the exit from Lovely Lane, both the entrance and exit to Priestley Street, and the exit to Sankey Way and Liverpool Road. In both phases the A57 Sankey Way eastbound is closed from Cromwell Avenue to the roundabout. The signed eastbound diversion runs Cromwell Avenue, A49 Winwick Road, Lythgoes Lane, Brick Street and Fennel Street, Mersey Street, Bridgefoot, Parker Street. Contractor: Tarmac Trading.

Bridgewater Avenue, Latchford. 3 August to 25 September 2026, and this one closes in the daytime, not overnight: 8:30am to 5:30pm through the school summer holidays, then 9am to 3pm and 4:30pm to 6pm once term restarts. No weekend working. Phase 1 diverts via Kingsway South, Richmond Avenue, Whitley Avenue, Barrymore Avenue and Mort Avenue; Phase 2 via Worsley Avenue, Morris Avenue and Mort Avenue; Phase 3 has no diversion. This is deeper work than a resurface, with the road planed to about 15cm below normal level, so the council warns access will be severely restricted while that is happening.

A56 Church Road, Lymm. Running since 29 June and due to finish by 22 August 2026. Closures 7pm to 1am Monday to Friday, between the Elm Tree Road and Rectory Lane junctions, with footway work at Brookfield Road and Lakeside Road and from the zebra crossing at The Dam up to Rectory Lane and Higher Lane. Signed diversion via Eagle Brow, The Cross and Rectory Lane. Residents needing access are told to come in via Brookfield Road. United Utilities is using the same closures to work on pipes between The Dam and Rectory Lane.

Brian Bevan Island, A49 Wilderspool Causeway and A5060 Chester Road. The resurfacing finished in the spring, but the long-life road markings were never laid because they need dry, settled weather and a road surface that is not fresh. The council said on 27 July that a full overnight closure of the roundabout is being programmed for a Tuesday evening in August, weather permitting, with notice boards going up on site a few days beforehand. No date is confirmed yet.

A57 Manchester Road eastbound, Grappenhall. Largely called off. The resurfacing and the planned contraflow were dropped on 8 July over traffic management safety concerns. Kerb replacement and ducting for the traffic signal detection loops continue, with evening lane closures rather than road closures.

M6 between junctions 20a and 21. National Highways repairs running from 7 April to the end of August 2026, overnight 8pm to 6am, lane closures only. Northbound work between 20a and 21 has been running since 29 June.

The Liverpool Road flood risk management scheme at Sankey Bridges is now finished on the road, but the Hood Lane resurfacing that was meant to follow it has been pushed back to later in 2026 because the flood works overran.

The swing bridges, and how often they really stop you

Three A-roads cross the Manchester Ship Canal in Warrington and every one of them does it on a bridge that swings open for shipping: the A5060 Chester Road, the A49 London Road at Stockton Heath and the A50 Knutsford Road. The canal and the shipping movements belong to Peel Ports, not the council, so nobody at the Town Hall decides when a ship comes through.

Local reputation says the bridges are forever swinging in rush hour. The council’s own quarterly record says otherwise, and the trend is sharply down.

Manchester Ship Canal swing bridge openings in Warrington by year Column chart of recorded swing bridge openings a year in Warrington. 2020 had 209 openings of which 29 were in peak hours, 2021 had 336 of which 37 were peak, 2022 had 298 of which 32 were peak, 2023 had 237 of which 29 were peak, 2024 had 151 of which 31 were peak, 2025 had 140 of which 22 were peak, and the first half of 2026 had 56 of which 3 were peak. Bridge openings have more than halved since 2021 Recorded openings of the three Manchester Ship Canal swing bridges in Warrington. Darker section = openings during peak hours. Source: Warrington Borough Council, Summary of Swing Bridge Openings 2020 to 2026 Q2. 2092020 3362021 2982022 2372023 1512024 1402025 562026 H1 Peak hours are 07:30 to 09:30 and 16:30 to 18:30 Monday to Thursday, and 07:30 to 09:30 and 15:30 to 18:30 on Friday. 2026 covers January to June only. Of the 40 openings in the second quarter, 29 were off peak and 2 were in peak hours.
140 openings across all three bridges in 2025, of which 22 fell in peak hours. That is roughly one peak-hour opening every seventeen days, spread over three crossings.

If you want warning rather than statistics, the council runs road signs that light up when the bridges are closed to traffic, and the @trafficwarr account posts an automated alert 25 to 30 minutes before an opening. The council’s swing bridges page has the sign-up details and publishes the openings record every three months.

There is a bigger question hanging over the crossings. In July 2026 the council submitted a bid to the Department for Transport’s Structures Fund for work on the swing bridges. The fund is a £1 billion government pot launched in April 2026 for urgent structural work councils cannot afford out of ordinary budgets. Decisions are expected in autumn 2026, and anything funded has to be finished by March 2030. If Warrington’s bid succeeds, the town should expect substantial bridge work inside that window.

The routes that carry the town

Warrington’s traffic problems are a map problem. The Mersey and the Manchester Ship Canal both run through the borough east to west, so almost every north-south journey funnels onto a handful of crossings. That is why a single closure at Bridgefoot or a bridge swing at Stockton Heath backs up so far so quickly.

The routes worth knowing:

  • A49 runs the length of the borough, north as Winwick Road and south as Wilderspool Causeway and London Road, crossing both the Mersey at Bridgefoot and the Ship Canal at Stockton Heath. When it is blocked, there is no equivalent alternative.
  • A57 is the east-west road through the north of the town, Sankey Way and Liverpool Road one side, Manchester Road the other.
  • A50 Knutsford Road and A5060 Chester Road are the other two canal crossings, and the obvious diversions when the A49 bridge swings.
  • A56 Church Road is Lymm’s main road, and the route villagers use to reach the motorways at Lymm Interchange.
  • The M6 runs north to south along the eastern edge of the borough and the M62 along the north, which is why a motorway incident so often ends up as queueing traffic on Warrington’s local roads.

The council looks after 377 bridges and structures in the borough, including 221 road bridges, 18 subways and 33 culverts, and maintains around 10% of them every year. The swing bridges are not among them: those belong to Peel Ports, and the Bridgewater Canal bridges to the Peel Group.

Parking and getting in without a car

The council runs contract parking at three sites, charged April to March and pro rata if you join mid-year:

  • Warrington West rail station: £140 a year Monday to Friday, £170 a year for seven days. Spaces are currently available.
  • Time Square multi-storey: £640 a year, or £53.33 a month.
  • Warrington Town Hall: £840 a year, or £70 a month, with a waiting list.

There is no park and ride scheme in Warrington. What there is instead is an unusually dense local rail network: Bank Quay, Central, Warrington West, Sankey for Penketh, Padgate, Birchwood and Glazebrook all sit inside the borough, and Central to Manchester takes 20 minutes. The trains page has the times and fares.

The council is also spending on bus priority through its Bus Service Improvement Plan, including bus gates on the A50 Long Lane westbound and the A49 Winwick Road southbound towards the town centre.

Checking for yourself

  • Warrington Borough Council roadworks lists every council scheme with its own detail page, phasing and diversion.
  • one.network shows all works on the highway network, including utility jobs the council is not running, and is what the council itself points people to.
  • National Highways covers the M6, M62 and M56.
  • Street Works section: 01925 442686, 01925 442693 or 01925 442511, 8:30am to 4:30pm Monday to Friday. Out of hours: 01925 443322.

More Warrington local information: house prices, trains to London, planning news and things to do in Warrington.