Brief intro from myself: first time poster based in Southport at the moment.
Went down to the old Leyland Trucks test track today before work commences on a new 850 home community in a scheme lead by Barratt homes, of Manchester.
Planning permission granted in summer 17.
Very easy to access after spotting a gap via Google earth (gap turned out to be an old access point to the track from a nearby main road for emergency services etc if needed back in its hayday. Anyway it will be a shame to see this place go its a vast site!
The former Leyland Test Track is on 130 acres of land, & opened in the
1970’s. It was used by Leyland Motors to trial both prototypes and vehicles
on a series of different road surfaces once they came off the production line.
Following the disposal of Leyland DAF Limited, Pilgrim Technologies (PTL)
retained the freehold ownership of the Test Track (believe the whole site is now council owned) The land adjoining the
Test Track is owned by the Council.
The former site of many of the outbuildings / workshops are now redeveloped into new warehousing.
The site was last used in 2005, commercially by a company called Toratrak.
The track is essentially a ‘P’ shape The straight bit of the ‘P’ was used for
high speed brake testing. The vehicle being tested could make several loops
of the banked oval to gain speed. Inside the oval are the usual array of vehicle tests.
These include 2 incline sections, a cobble road, undulating road, a water
Crossing, skid pan and suspension travel testing area.
Brief taken from report by Nudgersboss
Banked high speed track
From the top of the larger of the 2 incline tests
On site workshop is trashed
From the bottom of the incline tests
skid pan
water test
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