Dunham Bridge partially reopens after flood

The bridge will use traffic lights to control the flow of vehicles

A major road bridge closed for a week due to flooding has been partially reopened, a council said.

Dunham Bridge, which carries the A57 over the River Trent, shut after the river overflowed in the aftermath of Storm Henk.

Flood water had reached up to 6ft (1.82m) around the bridge and cars had become trapped.

Lincolnshire County Council said after pumping away water its engineers had reopened one lane to traffic.

However, the council warned it would "only be able to take a small fraction of the traffic it would normally manage".

There will now be traffic lights to manage the crossing.

The toll bridge, which links Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire, usually carries around 10,000 vehicles a day.

The council said there would be no fee until the bridge was fully restored.

Cars became trapped in flood water at Dunham Bridge

Richard Davies, executive member for highways at the local authority, praised the council staff who had worked on the bridge.

"Because the ground is so waterlogged at the base of the bridge and the sheer volume of water involved, it's taken a massive effort and some extremely difficult work to reach this stage," he said.

"Our crews have been excellent in what they've done."

He added: "We strongly advise that anyone traveling towards the bridge allows a lot of extra journey time to take into account the reduced capacity."