Lorries are to be banned from the Cotswolds to stop heavy goods vehicles following their sat-navs through country lanes and villages, it emerged yesterday.

The controversial £500,000 scheme will see trucks and lorries weighing more than 7.5 tonnes banned from 150 square miles of the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

Gloucestershire County Council approved the plans on Wednesday night and signs are expected to be installed in time for the pilot scheme to begin early next year.

The Lorry Management Zone is bounded by the M5 to the West, the A429 to the East, the A40/A436/A417 to the North and the A419 to the South.

Lorry drivers who make deliveries in the area will be encouraged to use designated roads suitable for HGV's such as the M5, A417, A419, A429, A436 and A40.

They will only be permitted access to narrow country lanes and villages when loading, unloading or approaching an operational HGV base.

The Lorry Management Zone will be enforced by police and trading standards with lorry drivers facing fines if they are caught breaking the rules.

Paula Hewitt, manager of the Air Balloon pub on the A46, said: ''Lorries do cause a lot of congestion here. There are quite a lot of accidents and it's always lorries.

''We have hundreds of lorries go past every day. The council has put a monitoring station here, so they are concerned about pollution.''

But Liberal Democrat Councillor Jeremy Hilton said he has ''little confidence'' in the project because he doesn't believe the rules can be effectively enforced.

He said: ''This scheme has many weaknesses. Most of the villages in Gloucestershire who are suffering from large lorries driving through their local roads are being ignored.

''This is only a pilot project and we have little confidence in the county council's plans to enforce the scheme.

''One of the major causes of the heavy lorries diverting through local villages is due to increasing use of Satellite Navigation devices.

''We need to work closely with the Satellite Navigation programmers as other councils are doing to ensure heavy lorries are diverted off country roads and onto major highways.''

The move comes after Somerset transport chiefs unveiled a new generation of sat-nav systems which should help bring an end to the heavy traffic being directed thorugh the rural roads and getting wedged in country lanes.

Somerset County Council is providing maps specifically for HGVs and freight vehicles to make sure rumbling juggernauts stay on the main roads – ensuring its pretty villages stay off the sat-nav map.

The Western Daily Press first revealed the council was working on the scheme last year after people in Wedmore, near Cheddar Gorge, asked for help.

Charlcombe, near Bath, has also seen coaches and trucks get stuck in its lanes, including a 44-tonne lorry from Lithuania which was wedged for four days last September.

Somerset and Suffolk county councils are now piloting the "truck friendly" sat-navs which produce county and regional freight maps which will offer preferred HGV routes and pinpoint locations of height and weight restricted bridges.

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