It  hopes to break the vicious cycle of stop-start investment by setting out strategic plans for key road routes in England.

The fresh approach is being piloted on the A1 west of Newcastle, the A12 in Essex and the M62 linking Manchester to Leeds.

A key element will be to work with local authorities and Local Enterprise Partnerships to tie road investment into local growth plans.

The long overdue strategic approach will be rolled out across the rest of the strategic road network by spring next year.

This evidence-based approach to assessing challenges and opportunities on a network-wide basis are designed to enable the Highways Agency and the Department for Transport to prioritise operational, maintenance and road improvement schemes.

This will be used to prioritise investment plans for the next full spending review in 2015.

Roads Minister Stephen Hammond said: “Our motorways and trunk roads play a vital role in the economic prosperity of this country.

That is why are implementing a smarter, more robust approach to identifying, prioritising and planning where vital investment is needed on our roads.

“I am confident the evidence that we will gather will enable us to develop longer term investment plans that better balance national and local priorities, allowing us to invest in improvements where they will have the greatest impact.”

The strategies contain an assessment of existing route performance, accident hot spots, bottlenecks, road fabric performance and maintenance and well as forecast traffic growth.

The evidence gathered from the strategies will:

• Allow a network-wide assessment of problems and challenges

• Provide an overview of what steps may need to be taken to address these problems and future challenges

• Be used to identify and prioritise potential solutions to be delivered during the next spending review period and beyond