The M62 at Scammonden near Huddersfield

Getting around by road in Yorkshire

While it's easy to enjoy a leisurely pace when enjoying all that Yorkshire's countryside and coast has to offer, getting around the region fast by road is not as easy unless you are close to one of the region's motorways.

The motorway routes crossing Yorkshire from east to west and north to south play an essential part in travelling around the region with little alternative for crossing the region quickly by road. More than 58 years after the opening of the first stretch of  M1 it became possible to drive from London to Newcastle by motorway in March 2018 after completion of a section of A1(M) across Yorkshire.

If your journey start and finish points are not near to one of these routes, you could easily face a choice of a time-consuming, fuel-conscious, leisurely direct route or heading for the motorway and a considerably longer mileage to get there as fast as possible.

The M62 at the junction with the M1 near Lofthouse The M62 starts at North Cave, 18 miles west of Hull docks, and passes through East Yorkshire, a small part of North Yorkshire and across West Yorkshire before crossing The Pennines near Huddersfield at the highest point on Britain's motorway network. The road can become very busy at peak commuter hours, particularly just south of Leeds, where there have been attempts to increase capacity of the road by turning it into a 'smart' motorway with overhead gantry signs.

Apart from short sections of urban dual carriageway in congested towns and cities and a few short bypasses around towns and villages, the only other notable dual carriageway routes in the Yorkshire region are:

A168/A19	- linking the A1(M) near Dishforth to Middlesbrough (32 miles).
M18	- linking the M1 in South Yorkshire with the M62 in East Yorkshire and to the M180 leading to North Lincolnshire (27 miles).
A64	- from the A1(M) at Bramham to its bottleneck beyond the York by-pass (19.7 miles).
A63	- Hull docks to the point where the M62 starts (18 miles).
M621	- Linking M62 and M1 to Leeds (8.5 miles).
A650	- from Bingley to Keighley (4.7 miles).
A629	- Keighley to Cross Hills (4 miles).
M606	- Bradford ring road to M62 (2.7 miles).

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Typical travel times and speeds

Typical travel times across the region are unlikely to average above 50 mph unless the journey starts and finishes near to one of the motorways.
Examples are:

Doncaster - Ingleton	88 miles	2hr 8min	Average 41mph
Sheffield - Middlesbrough	99 miles	1hr 48min	Average 55mph
Huddersfield - Scarborough	90 miles	1hr 54min	Average 47mph
Halifax- Hornsea	80 miles	1hr 44min	Average 46mph
Goole - Northallerton	69 miles	1hr 11mins	Average 58mph
or	58 miles	1hr 24mins	Average 41mph
Rotherham - Richmond	86 miles	1hr 37mins	Average 53mph
Skipton - Bridlington	89 miles	2hr 13min	Average 40mph
Bradford - Whitby	90 miles	1hr 57min	Average 46mph

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