SOUTH Dorset MP Jim Knight said today that he was delighted at residents' response to a public appeal for them to support Weymouth's much-needed relief road.

Mr Knight said he had written to constituents asking them to make their views known on the newly-submitted relief road plans so they could be taken into account before a crucial county planning committee to determine permission for the scheme on a date which has yet to be fixed.

He added: "Local people and businesses know how important this road is to our area's future prosperity.

"More than 1,000 residents have expressed support for the relief road."

Those responses have been presented to county principal planning officer Chris Stokes by Mr Knight and Weymouth's Broadwey county councillor Harry Burden.

Mr Burden said: "I'm really pleased with the level of support local residents continue to show for the relief road.

"There is still time for residents to send in their comments to the county council and it is important that their views are heard."

Hundreds of people have already made sure that their support for the road is known by signing so many letters that Dorchester Road Action Group co-ordinator David Woods had to go home to print a fresh stock of unsigned letters.

He estimated that at least 1,500 people signed up at the Morrisons supermarket in Weymouth with 99 per cent of them giving local Weymouth postcodes.

Those letters have now been handed in to Mr Stokes, and Mr Woods stressed that this overwhelming local support was important because the overwhelming volume of protestors - 76 per cent - do not even live in Dorset.

He added that a relief road for Weymouth had never been more needed, not least because 600 vehicles had been involved in accidents outside his Dorchester Road home in the last 10 years.

He said: "I have now used up every comment letter I have. We did not canvass a single person. Everyone who came forward did so because they wanted to.

"It is such an important issue that people are coming forward in their hundreds, particularly after it was revealed that so many protestors don't even come from Dorset, never mind from Weymouth.

"We need people to support this road because without it Weymouth will grind to a halt long before it hears the starting gun for the Olympics."

The county council's relief road scheme goes before tomorrow's Weymouth and Portland planning and traffic committee meeting for councillors to decide whether or not they wish to go along with a recommendation that they should show their support for the project.

Residents who want to make their views known to the county planning department can do so by writing to the chief planning officer at Dorset County Council, County Hall, Dorchester DT1 1XJ or by submitting their comments online at the site www.dorsetforyou.com/reliefroadcomments