M6 motorway from the beginning of A14 in Catthorpe near Rugby in central England, passes between Coventry, Bedworth and Nuneaton, through Birmingham, Walsall and Stafford and near the smaller cities of Wolverhampton and Stoke-on-Trent. The motorway has major junctions with the M55 at Junction 32, north of Preston ending just before Blackpool, the M65 at Junction 29, south of Preston, towards Blackburn and then Burnley, the M56 and M62 at Warrington, giving access to Chester, Manchester and Liverpool. The M6 then heads north past Wigan, Preston and Lancaster. After the latter two cities it passes through Cumbria with some parts very close
M6 motorway July 1972 the UK Minister for Transport Industries announced that of UK motorway particularly prone to fog would benefit from lighting in a project which "should be" completed by 1973. Sections to be illuminated included the M6 between junctions 10 and 11, and between junctions 20 and 27. In March 2006, after 15 years of debate, the government authorised the construction of a extension of the M6 from its then northern terminus near Carlisle to the Anglo-Scottish border at Gretna (the so-called "Cumberland Gap"), where it links into the existing A74(M). The road opened on 5 December 2008, the 50th