The M5 between Junction 16 (A38, Aztec West and Filton) and Junction 17 (A4018, Cribbs Causeway) runs along the northern edge of Bristol. Junction 17 is the exit for The Mall at Cribbs Causeway, the shopping centre that opened beside the motorway in 1998. In the Department for Transport’s 2025 counts this stretch carried 121,685 vehicles a day, making it the fourth busiest on the M5. Here is our guide to M5 Junction 16 to 17 traffic.

Latest M5 traffic news near Cribbs Causeway

Everything currently reported on the M5 is on our latest M5 traffic news page. For overnight work, see M5 closures tonight.

How much traffic is there between Junction 16 and 17?

Spread evenly over a day and night, 121,685 vehicles is about 5,070 an hour, or roughly 85 a minute. In practice the road is much busier at some times than others, so treat that as a sense of scale rather than what you will see at any given moment.

This stretch serves two kinds of journey at once: long-distance traffic on the M5 between the Midlands and the South West, and local trips to Aztec West, Filton and Cribbs Causeway. That mix of through traffic and people joining and leaving is part of what keeps it busy.

Cars, vans and lorries on M5 J16 to J17

Cars and taxis make up about 74% of the flow, about 90,630 a day. Lorries number 9,618 a day, around 7.9%, and there are about 21,437 other vehicles, mainly vans.

With so many vehicles joining and leaving over a short distance, it pays to keep a safe gap and to move into the right lane in good time for your exit. Our M5 accidents page has simple tips, and M5 roadworks shows planned work on this part of the motorway.

What “vehicles a day” means

The Department for Transport counts traffic on every motorway in Great Britain each year. The figure it publishes for a stretch like Junction 16 to 17 is an annual average daily flow: the number of vehicles passing a point on an average day, with every day of the year counted, weekdays and weekends, busy summer days and quiet winter nights. It covers both directions together. That makes it a good way to compare one stretch of motorway with another, but no single day looks exactly like the average.

The junctions around J16 and J17

Junction 17 takes the A4018 towards Cribbs Causeway and Henbury. Beyond it the M5 continues to Junction 18 for Avonmouth and Junction 18a, where the M49 heads off towards the Severn crossings. Back towards the north, the stretch from Junction 15 at Almondsbury, where the M4 meets the M5, to Junction 16 is the third busiest stretch of the M5.

Gordano Services at Junction 19 are the nearest services heading south, and Michaelwood Services, between Junctions 13 and 14, are the nearest heading north. See the whole route on our map of the M5 junctions.

How J16 to J17 compares

This stretch is fourth in the table of the busiest stretches of the M5 below, just behind its neighbour at Almondsbury.

Rank	M5 stretch	Vehicles per day	Cars & taxis	Lorries
1	J5 to J6	150,612	108,634	15,176
2	J4a to J5	136,816	99,318	13,457
3	J15 to J16	129,400	97,396	10,610
4	J16 to J17	121,685	90,630	9,618
5	J1 to J2	119,998	83,626	11,454
6	J20 to J21	118,811	92,064	7,702

Traffic figures are annual average daily flows, both directions together, from the Department for Transport road traffic statistics for 2025. The DfT measures the M5 at 55 count points; the ranking uses the 24 stretches that run between numbered junctions. Where a stretch has more than one count point, the busiest measured point is shown. Hourly and per-minute figures are simple averages across the whole day and night, not peak-time figures. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.