THE A56 in Prestwich is part of the fifth most congested road in the UK outside London.

Figures released by travel monitoring site INRIX show the A56 from Hilton Lane in Prestwich down to Northumberland Street in Salford is the fifth most congested road.

Drivers using the road spend around 33 hours per year stuck in traffic on this stretch, which is most congested in the afternoon.

The A56/Bury New Road is one of three Manchester roads which featured on the list and the figures reveal the city's economy lost £345 million last year to drivers stuck in their cars.

The other two roads in Manchester are the A6 and A580.

Across Manchester drivers spend an average of 39 hours a year in jams during peak hours and 10 per cent of their total drive time in gridlock.

Sedgley Ward Conservative councillor, David Silbiger said: "Morning and late afternoons are the worst. I can't imagine they would consider widening it because they have spent millions reducing the road higher up. But being a route from the M60 it's really impacting rush hour.

"I have found more and more if you don't get the right response you just do it again. It makes it an even more of a fallacy.

"I can't see what can be done to improve it. It's surprising to me to hear it's the fifth most congested road and it's not as bad during a regular day but it is bad at rush hour.

"There's some schools between Prestwich and Broughton Park.

"But similarly, Bury Old Road is bad too.

"It would need a traffic management review and I'm concerned about the impact when the scheme is completed higher up the road, it could make it worse."

Liberal Democrat group leader and Holyrood ward representative, Cllr Tim Pickstone, said: "Everyone in Prestwich knows how busy the A56 is and now this has been recognised by this national study.

"What people experience all over Prestwich is some quite significant traffic problems. This isn't just the A56 it's all over the town, in the rat runs where people are trying to avoid the main roads.

"This has definitely got worse since the work started on the A56. It's just awful.

"We would call on the council to recognise the traffic problems it has caused and work with residents to see how we can improve the situation."

Environment cabinet member, Labour's Cllr Alan Quinn said: "In 2012 in Bury there were 90,000 licensed cars by 2016 the number was 100,418. In Manchester they've gone up from 129,346 to 146,418.

"The smart motorway, the M60, when they were consulting I asked Highway England why are they doing this, they said 'in the next 10 years the traffic will increase by 43 per cent in Greater Manchester'.

"Figures like that are unsustainable. I'm a motorist, I travel all over and the roads are gridlocked wherever you go."

Cllr Quinn felt a focus on improving transport in Greater Manchester was needed and said poor public transport drives people to use cars.

He said: "When people are parking up in Prestwich and getting the tram in it doesn't surprise me but what are we supposed to do?

"This development is about giving Prestwich a future."