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"Tories pledge to dual A1" was the Newcastle Journal headline, but does the Conservative announcement it referred to really mean an upgrade is certain if they win power?

No - is the answer. There are still plenty more hurdles ahead.

It may make it easier to upgrade the A1 from Newcastle to Scotland, but there's no guarantee we'll see it converted to dual carriageway any time soon.

What the Shadow Transport Secretary announced today was a plan to reclassify the A1 north of Newcastle as a road of national significance.

At the moment it doesn't have that status.

That means any funding for improvements have to come from the regional North East roads budget.

The estimated £400m bill would swallow that budget whole, leaving nothing for any other parts of the region.

For that reason, the upgrade just hasn't happened.

The Tories then would bring it back into the national roads programme, with its much bigger budget.

So there will then potentially be more chance to access the funds needed, but just how much of a chance?

Theresa Villiers admitted she couldn't make any promises.

Any plan to dual the A1 would still have to compete against other road projects up and down the country.

It would also be competing at a time when money is likely to be incredibly tight.

There is absolutely no guarantee the change will make it happen any sooner.

Labour and the Liberal Democrats have been keen to point that out.

Labour say the Conservatives are making promises they can't afford.

And at the Look North debate on Tuesday, North East minister Nick Brown said he thought the solution was a combination of regional and national funds.

He also pointed out that the Conservatives pledged to upgrade the A1 in 1992, but it never happened.

The Lib Dems though do agree the A1 should be classed as a road of national significance.

But they insist Nick Clegg is the leader who's the most committed to making an upgrade happen (despite a manifesto commitment to cutting £3bn from the roads budget).

In reality none of the parties have a concrete manifesto commitment to dual the A1. None of them have set aside specific funds to do it.

So whoever wins the election, we're unlikely to see a wholesale upgrade imminently. More likely are incremental improvements over many years.

But to be fair at least it has now been put on the election agenda.

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