OUR brave new world, once upon a time, was supposed to be linked by a series of expressways when the population topped 200,000.

Finer minds than mine devised north-south and east-west routes, all ready for the day when our historic South Lancashire borough, through the utopia of the New Town dream, finally came of age.

That day, incidentally, was supposed to occur some time in 1991.

Good old Mrs Thatcher might have put paid to the wilder excesses of our ambitious New Town forefathers, and the expansion estimates were revised downwards as a result.

But we’ve arrived at the same juncture, albeit 30-odd years later, an economic Northern powerhouse (with apologies) running on a Morris Minor road network, creaking perilously under its own success.

Fanfares might ring out at Podium Towers for the announcement, this week, that the Centre Park Link, at least 10 years hence from the first discussions, is finally on the starting grid.

This long-awaited town centre bypass might solve one headache. But stock up on paracetamol – it does little to assuage the gridlock south of the river.

Our leisurely expedition out last Thursday night to reach Lower Whitley and Great Budworth involved intricate plotting from Padgate to Daresbury.

Loushers Lane was a virtual car park, forget trying to go the easy way up London Road through Stockton Heath. Only if you’ve got wings.

It was fairly easy to surmise – and later confirmed – that the bridges were out at teatime. And as everyone knows from Warburton to Moore, that’s fatal to hundreds of motorists’ plans for an easy dash home.

One quick study of the old New Town road proposals (isn’t my homework fun?!) reveals the full extent of what was thought necessary, by our post-war planners to make boom town Warrington work.

Birchwood Way and Midland Way, and a laughably unambitious Westbrook Way, are among the few remnants of the grand scheme to become a reality. Even the location of junction eight of the M62 was shifted significantly, for Ikea’s lookout.

No-one is pretending there’s any easy quick-fix solutions to this dilemma. But our regenerators need to cast their eyes both sides of the river, to bridge the gap between post-war idealism and 21st-century necessities.

  •  Helen Jones (and David Mowat for that matter) voted in favour of the air strikes policy in Syria.

One can only hope the Warrington North representative wasn’t subjected to the same disgraceful treatment meted out to some of her Parliamentary colleagues, by the new Militant Tendency which has taken over Labour.

Whether you agree with the premise or not, and there’s no cut and dried answer either way with Syria (or Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan etc, etc), in a grown-up democracy you don’t harangue MPs with foul and abusive threats.

Perhaps not surprisingly, Former Stockton Heath lawyer Fiona Bruce was also in favour, ex-Warrington councillor Yvonne Forvague (Makerfield) wasn’t, neither was Culcheth-raised Andy Burnham, while Newton’s elected representative Connor McGinn also went through the ‘yes’ lobby.

  •  One dart down Winwick Road (outside of the town’s three or four rush hours) revealed two very different sides of life.

First of all, hats off to Warrington Collegiate for their giant display on Rianne Chester, who not only won a gold medal at the WorldSkills championships in August but was later named their adult learner of the year.

Before then though, the still-to-be-completed Alban Retail Park provoked wonder. Whole towns in Cheshire and Lancashire can’t boast that much retail space in their entirety.

Kiss goodbye if you’re trying to get home to Burtonwood, Winwick or Newton though.