HUGE traffic jams built up on the A64 near York today as thousands of motorists heading for the coast got stuck in a bottleneck.

The warm Easter sunshine prompted a mass exodus from York and West Yorkshire cities such as Leeds to coastal resorts such as Scarborough.

But the route was overwhelmed at the Hopgrove roundabout north-east of York, where it narrows from a dual carriageway to a single carriageway.

The resulting jam stretched back along the A64 all the way past the Grimston Bar junction with the A1079, the Fulford junction with the A19 and the York Outer Ring Road junction near Copmanthorpe, and reached almost as far west as the Bilbrough Top junction, halfway between York and Tadcaster.

Hopes of an end to such regular bank holiday motoring misery by dualling the A64 east of Hopgrove were boosted in 2017 when it emerged that four detailed options were now being examined by Highways England, which had concluded that further improvements to the Hopgrove junction alone would fail to deal with notorious congestion problems, and the pinch-point created by the single carriageway east of it needed to be tackled.

Transport specialists were set to work on drawing up four different options to provide a dual carriageway.

But The Press revealed last month that the dualling plans might be in jeopardy after highways experts concluded a number of bridges will be needed, pushing up the costs.

Thirsk and Malton MP Kevin Hollinrake said then he was extremely concerned that the project to create a dual carriageway between the Hopgrove roundabout and Barton Hill could be shelved, but he would continue to press for the scheme to go ahead.