A FURIOUS businessman says his car was a virtual write-off after an automatic bollard smashed through the engine and made the air bags explode.

The automatic bollard that guards Durham City's toll road caused more than £6,500 of damage to the car, belonging to Nichol de Cazenove, managing director of a software company in Hertfordshire.

Mr de Cazenove said he suffered chest pains after the accident and his wife had breathing difficulties and was badly left shocked after an airbag went off in her face.

He is calling on Durham County Council, which pioneered the city toll road, to make it safer and improve the instructions to motorists approaching the pay point.

There have been 111 incidents at the pay point since the charge was introduced in October 2002 to cut traffic in the historic peninsula area.

Mr de Cazenove said he entered the charging zone inadvertently and was unaware of the toll. He was following another car that had paid the toll when the bollard struck.

He said signs on the approach to the pay machine were not helpful and precise enough, and that the red and green light and instructions for payment were not facing oncoming drivers and could not be seen easily.

While he agreed with the aim of the charge, he thought the system dangerous.

Breakdown boss Fred Henderson, whose firm has recovered several of the damaged vehicles, said drivers were unable to see the bollard from their vehicles and that the lights should face oncoming traffic directly, possibly with an amber warning.

A council spokesman said the authority was happy with scheme, which has cut traffic by 85 per cent and won several awards, but was "not deaf to what people say''.

He said the 111 incidents were a tiny percentage of the 150,000 vehicles that had passed through the charge point and that "the vast majority'' were caused by drivers trying to avoid the charge.