More than £150,000 is needed to repair a major Witham road which has reached a critical condition.

Alarm bells have been raised by Essex County Council highways chiefs over the state of The Avenue.

Years of heavy traffic using the route as a cut through to the A12, town centre and Braintree has worn away supporting earth.

Now there is just six inches of ground supporting the road - the same level used to hold up a footpath.

HGV lorries are to be banned from using the road in a bid to eke out the life of the road until work can go ahead.

Engineers told Witham Town Council at an emergency planning meeting The Avenue was in such a desperate state it needed to be ripped out and a new road put in.

But despite the severe problems the road has, work on the project - expected to take six weeks - will not go ahead until next year at the earliest.

The condition of the road was discovered by an Essex County Council survey costing several thousand pounds.

The survey had been carried out after town councillors grew concerned over recurring problems on the road.

Essex County Council tried to fix the problem last year by putting in drainage pipes. It was only a temporary solution and experts were called in.

Bob Wiltshire, traffic engineer for highway maintenance, said: "To keep going out and fixing problems as and when they happen would be throwing good money after bad.

"I know £150,000 is a lot of money but it is needed to address the real problems of the road."

But he added the county's coffers could not meet this cost until next year.

He said: "I have not got a crystal ball, but I hope this will mean the road can hold out for another 12 months."

Town councillor Joy Reekie said: "When I saw the survey I was horrified. I am glad the county council is now planning to do something about it.

"But I want to know what would have happened if we had not kept pressurising them to take a look at The Avenue.

"Do we have to do this every time we want something done?"

The county engineers said they would take the concerns on board before going ahead with the repairs.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.