M6 Toll

The M6 Toll, referred to on some signs as the Midland Expressway (originally named the Birmingham Northern Relief Road or BNRR), and stylised as M6toll, connects M6 Junction 3a at the Coleshill Interchange to M6 Junction 11A at Wolverhampton with 27 miles (43 km) of six-lane motorway.

The M6 Toll is the only major toll road in Great Britain, and has two payment plazas, Great Wyrley Toll Plaza for northbound and Weeford Toll Plaza for southbound. The northbound toll plaza is situated between junctions T6 and T7, and the southbound between junctions T4 and T3. The weekday contactless card cost is £10.50 for a car and £18.20 for a Heavy Goods Vehicle.

The M6 Toll is part of the (unsigned in the UK) E-road E05 and is subject to the same regulations and policing as other motorways in the UK. It has one service station along its 27-mile (43 km) stretch, Norton Canes services.

Proposals for a new publicly funded motorway were circulated in 1980. It was originally to be called the A446(M)^{[citation needed]} Birmingham Northern Relief Road (BNRR) and designed to alleviate the increasing congestion on the M6 through Birmingham and the Black Country in England, as well as improving road links to neighbouring parts of Staffordshire and North Warwickshire. This was the busiest section of the M6, carrying up to 180,000 vehicles per day when it was designed to carry only 72,000.

Five alternative routes were put for consultation in 1980 and a preferred route was published in 1986. In 1989 there was a public inquiry relating to a publicly funded motorway.

In 1989 it was announced that it would be built privately and a competition took place which was won by Midland Expressway Limited in 1991. The contract was for a 53-year concession to build and operate the road as an early form of public private partnership with the operator paying for the construction and recouping its costs by setting and collecting tolls, allowing for a 3-year construction period followed by 50 years of operation. At the end of this period the infrastructure would be returned to the Government. Toll rates are set at the discretion of the operator at six-monthly intervals and there is no cap on the rates charged.

There was a second public inquiry from relating to the new scheme in 1994–1995 and a decision to go ahead in 1997. A legal challenge was made by the "Alliance against BNRR" which was cleared in 1998.

Midland Expressway Limited contracted out the construction of the road to a consortium of major contractors Carillion, Alfred McAlpine, Balfour Beatty and Amec (together known as CAMBBA).