Humber Bridge booths set to be axed in three years' time as payments go online

Coun Richard Hannigan, who chairs the Humber Bridge Board, said he wanted to make the new system as user friendly as possible.

Coun Hannigan said: “What really attracted me to the idea was using the Dartford Crossing. I turned up not knowing that the booths had gone.

"The fact was it was so well sign-posted and the process of payment online was so easy, I thought crikey, this is the way to go.”

Coun Hannigan said there always would be a cash option with people able to go to the Humber Bridge offices and pay in person.

However Liberal Democrat opposition leader on East Riding Council David Nolan said it was “poor customer service” to remove the option of paying at a toll booth as “not everybody has smart phones or IT equipment”.

Coun Nolan is also concerned that the removal of toll booths, which slow and filter north-bound traffic, as it approaches the nearby A164 roundabout, will cause more congestion.

He said: “If they are removed, the traffic will arrive at the roundabout in a stream, thereby adding to the existing congestion at peak times.”

However Coun Hannigan insisted that while the booths slow down traffic at peak times, it won’t affect congestion on the roundabout “as that’s down to volume”.

He said: “We know that the roundabout has capacity issues for sure, that’s about the total vehicle capacity, not about the volume on the bridge.

"It is being modelled out. We are in discussions with East Riding highways as to how they might improve the junction.”

Coun Hannigan said a decision still had to be made by the Humber Bridge Board on moving to the new system, and that would be within the coming year.

They don’t intend making any staff redundant with people working on the booths being redeployed.

On average there are 33,000 crossings per day across the bridge which connects East Yorkshire with northern Lincolnshire.

The 1.4 mile-long (2.2km) suspension bridge near Hessle was opened on 24 June 1981.

Tolls for a single journey were reduced from £3 to £1.50 in 2012, after the government cleared £150m of the bridge's £330m debt.

The Humber Bridge went cashless in 2021, with motorists now paying using the HumberTAG, credit or debit card, or mobile payment.