I regularly use the most expensive road in the Midlands and this one thing justifies the £10

With two large toll booths and sweeping views of the countryside, the M6 Toll offers motorists something different

There's no doubt the cost of driving has become more expensive in 2024. Motorists are feeling the pinch of owning a car with the price of petrol, insurance and tax going up.

After years of taking for granted the affordability of driving, it's now become an expensive bill for many of us. So why then would you pay to use a toll road - adding more to your bill - when there are free alternatives?

It would be a rather straightforward answer - if you didn't live in the West Midlands, that is. But then let's throw into the equation the chaos of the M6, at rush hour, where you can guarantee there will be hefty queues. An extra 30 minutes here, or an hour there, added to your journey time.

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After a hard day's work, or if you're already on a long drive passing through the West Midlands, the answer doesn't become quite so simple. The M6 Toll opened in 2003 and is the UK's longest toll road, spanning 27 miles between Junctions 3a and 11a of the M6, effectively bypassing the core of Birmingham and the Black Country.

It's the UK's most expensive toll, too - by a good margin. The price of a full journey costs £9.70, almost a tenner. In comparison, the next most expensive toll roads are the Mersey Tunnels in Liverpool, priced at £4.20, less than half of that of the M6 Toll.

Like the general cost of living, which has gone up in recent years, so too has the price of M6 Toll. In 2020, the price to travel its entirety was £6.70 (you can pay to travel a part of the way as well).

As of April this year, the overall cost had risen to £8.90. Four months on, and the price has increased again by 80p as of September. By this rate, soon it will be over £10. That could be £10 better spent on petrol or diesel, it could be said.

So why then would you choose to shed that much money on a toll road when the region has a plethora of free roads? Well, in my view, the answer comes down to peace of mind. The M6 Toll bypasses the M6 along one of its busiest stretches.

As it winds its way across the Staffordshire countryside, it avoids the chaos of the likes of Spaghetti Junction, the M5 Interchange at Junction 8, Junction 9 in Wednesbury, Junction 10 in Walsall and Junction 10a for the M54 north of Wolverhampton. A 16-mile stretch with notoriously busy pinch-points - although there are others too.

When you've spent 30 minutes crawling a meagre nine miles between Junction 10a and Junction 9, the £10 price tag doesn't seem too bad. Sure, the M6 isn't always congested and it's easy enough to drive during quieter periods.

And it definitely isn't affordable for many drivers to travel up and down the M6 Toll each day, paying almost £20. But for the odd journey, to escape the jaws of the bulging M6, I believe it's worth it.