A major new link road aimed at relieving some of Bolton’s busiest routes is also set to include flood defences.

The Horwich Loco Works spine road is one of the most anticipated projects the borough has seen in recent years and comes as part of a wider plan to build more than 2,000 houses.

Work has continued on the road throughout this year and Bolton West MP Chris Green says it should also include much needed flood defences.

Mr Green said: “Horwich has periodically had to been hit by floods and this is one of the main things that I’ve been concerned about, along with more general concerns about how Winter Hill gets flooded every so often.

“So part of this project is that the Horwich Link Road will include huge pipes that can store vast amounts of water, which will then be released more slowly.”

Horwich has often been hit by floods in recent yearsHorwich has often been hit by floods in recent years (Image: Public)

Mr Green said that releasing the water more slowly would help to make sure that the sewage system was not overwhelmed and prevent sewage being dumped into waterways.

Horwich has long been the site of repeated flooding, with warning having been issued only last autumn when the UK was hit by repeated major storms.

The wider Horwich Loco Works project will be made up of more than 2,000 new houses off Chorley New Road, over what had once been a major industrial site.

The link road was proposed as a way of relieving the extra traffic on what are already some of the borough’s busiest roads that would be created by people coming to live in the new homes.

It has been a much-trailed development since the government agreed to around £12M worth of funding in 2018.

This came after a visit from the then secretary of state for communities Sajid Javid MP to the site.

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Mr Green said: “I was delighted to invite the secretary of state at the time to help secure the funding but also so he could here from Craig Rotheram and the Horwich and Blackrod First team about the importance of the project.

“So I’d really like to thank them for the contribution they made.”

But Conservative Mr Green's Labour opponent Phil Brickell has said that a much wider overhaul of the planning system is needed.

He also said he wants to see tougher measures to hold water companies to account over sewage discharge incidents.

Mr Brickell said: "I am committed to improving local infrastructure, including flood prevention measures and steps to alleviate traffic across the Bolton West constituency.

"Our streets are chock a block with traffic due to a broken planning system which takes years critical infrastructure such as bypasses to be built."

Also standing in Bolton West are Liberal Democrat candidate Donald McIntosh, Vicki Attenborough of the Green Party, Dylan Evans of Reform UK and Patrick McGrath of the English democrats.