Car insurance: M1 motorway turns 50

Thursday, 05 November 2009

The 50th anniversary of the M1 motorway has been marked by the unveiling of a plaque at its most famous service station, Watford Gap, in Northamptonshire, car insurance customers may be interested to know.

Opened on November 2nd 1959, the M1 was Britain's first motorway linking cities, with the first section being between junctions 5 (Watford) and 18 (Crick).

Designed to take up to 20,000 vehicles a day, the M1 now typically handles around 150,000, according to the Sun.

To celebrate the anniversary, Guardian.co.uk has published a series of photographs from the last 50 years on the 193-mile road.

From the 1959 official opening of the M1 by then transport minister Ernest Marples, the photographs show how the motorway has changed over time.

There are also a number of more harrowing photographs, such as an aerial view of the wreckage of the British Midland Boeing 737 plane which crashed on the M1 at Kegworth in 1989 and Princess Diana's funeral cortege on the M1 at Toddington, Bedfordshire on route to Althorp in 1997.

By Claire Carter

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