The M40 motorway links London, Oxford, and Birmingham in England, a distance of about 89 miles (143 km). The motorway is dual three lanes except for junction 1A to junction 3 (which is dual four lanes) a short section in-between the exit and entry slip-roads at junction 4 (which is two lanes in both directions) and also between the slip-roads at junction 9 (in the south-eastbound direction only). An Active Traffic Management system operates on the short section north-westbound from junction 16 (A3400) to the M42.
History
London to Great Milton The motorway between London and Oxford was constructed in stages between 1967 and 1974. The first section opened in June 1967, from Handy Cross roundabout, High Wycombe to Stokenchurch (junctions 4–5). In 1969, extending in a southerly direction to Holtspur, Beaconsfield, a temporary junction 2 was opened. The section bypassing Beaconsfield was built in 1971 and the section past Gerrards Cross to junction 1 was completed in 1973. In 1974, the motorway between junctions 5 to 8 was completed to Great Milton. Between junctions 3 and 4, the beginnings of slip roads were built on both carriageways for a service area at Abbey Barns between Beaconsfield and High Wycombe. Beaconsfield services off junction 2 opened in 2009.
Great Milton to Birmingham Late in the 1960s, not long after the first stretch opened, the Ministry of Transport announced the possibility of building a new motorway to link London with Birmingham as an alternative to the M1–M6 route – as well as improving road links to the South Coast ports for The Midlands – but it was not until December 1984 that the decision to extend the M40 from Oxford to the south of Birmingham was given the go-ahead, with the anticipation of the route being built in three phases and being fully operational by 1990. The preferred route was altered to avoid Otmoor after a vigorous road protest, which included selling over 3,000 small squares of a field to people all over the world. The field had been renamed 'Alice's field' as a reference to Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll who lived in the area at the time of the book's writing. Construction began at Warwick in October 1987, with work on the section around Banbury starting in February 1988, and finally, the section north of Oxford in July 1989. The 12-mile section between the M42 and Warwick opened in December 1989, and the remaining 48-mile section in January 1991. The section between Banbury and Warwick had been completed several months earlier, but its opening was delayed until the Banbury to Oxford section was ready, to avoid the inevitable congestion of A-roads in north Oxfordshire towards the end of 1990 that an earlier opening would have caused.
At the time of being fully opened, the original M40 had been widened, creating a dual three-lane motorway from start to finish, with the exception of the Handy Cross underpass, which remains dual two-lane.
Further developments
The M40 had been expected to be the last major motorway to be built in Britain, but in 1986 the Conservative government announced a major new road-building scheme, Roads for Prosperity, much of which was cancelled in 1996 after major road protests. Beginning in 1997, the motorway was widened to dual-four-lane between J1A and J3 (High Wycombe East) under a Private Finance Initiative. It was completed by a Carillion-John Laing joint venture in October 1998 – the original plan included widening between J3 and J4. Oxford services and Warwick Services opened in 1998. Work to separate local and long-distance traffic at J4 was completed in 2007, including a new dedicated left-turn slip lane between the A404 Marlow Bypass and the Oxford-bound M40; additional lanes on the slip roads entering the roundabout; an additional lane between the A404 Marlow Hill and the London-bound M40; and a five-lane cross-link between the M40 and the A404(S). In 2009 the Highways Agency extended the Active Traffic Management (ATM) system onto the northbound carriageway from J16 to the junction with the M42. Beaconsfield services opened in 2009, near the site of the service station proposed at Abbey Barns almost 40 years earlier. In August 2010 work started on J9, upgrading the southbound exit slip road to three lanes, and similar widening on the connecting A34 and A41 junctions between Oxford and Bicester. This was the first part of the work at this busy junction since it was built 20 years earlier. If the necessary funding becomes available, a second phase of improvement will be carried out, upgrading the northbound entrance and the A41 southbound entrance.
Route
Main towns/cities served The following table only includes places situated near the motorway and those close enough to be considered 'near the motorway' (like Aylesbury). Other places that may use the motorway (for access to the north) are not included as they have other motorway access (for example Slough). Small villages are not included. Population figures are based on the 2001 census by the Office for National Statistics
List of junctions
Data from driver location signs are used to provide distance and carriageway identifier information. Where a junction spans several hundred metres, both start and end locations are given. An Active Traffic Management system operates on the short section northbound from junction 16 (A3400) to the M42.
Services The motorway has four service areas:
Beaconsfield services (off J2), operated by Extra MSA accessible from the A355 Oxford services (off J8A), operated by Welcome Break, accessible from J8 and the A418 Cherwell Valley services (off J10, A43), operated by Moto. Warwick services (between J12 and J13), operated by Welcome Break, consisting of two sites mirroring each other without a connection. A motorway service station was proposed at Abbey Barn to cost £700,000, south of High Wycombe in November 1973, north of Little Marlow, next to the former Wycombe Summit. A similar motorway service station was proposed at Hensall, North Yorkshire on the (unbuilt) M62 in December 1973, and which likewise was neither built.
Detailed route description
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