Trackway & ground protection hire
Aluminium roadway and ground mats that keep vehicles moving on grass. Delivered, set up and collected by suppliers who cover your patch.
Trackway hire typically costs £20 to £40 per metre for aluminium panel roadway including installation, with minimum charges around £500 to £800. It is essential on grass sites for caterers, toilet servicing and marquee lorries. Measure gate-to-drop-zone distance for your quantity.
Trackway is the item nobody thinks of until a vehicle sinks, and by then it costs triple. Any event on grass that expects deliveries (which is all of them: marquee lorry, toilet unit, catering van, the band’s Sprinter) should price a protected route from the gate to the working area, plus a pad where vehicles turn or park. Suppliers and organisers use several names for the same product: aluminium roadway, temporary roadway and trackway all mean the interlocking panel system below.
Aluminium panel roadway takes full HGV weight and is the standard for supplier routes. Lighter plastic mats handle pedestrian routes, wheelchair access and light vans. The British weather makes the decision simple: if the event matters and the ground is grass, the question is how many metres, not whether.
Booking follows the marquee's build schedule, not the guest list: because crews lay the route before any other supplier arrives, most site services companies ask for the marquee build date as soon as it is confirmed, then slot the trackway crew in the day before. A short lead time is possible in a dry summer; a wet spring books out fast, since every organiser wants the same short run of dry days.
PLANNING RATIOTriggered whenever the venue is a field or lacks hardstanding access. Measure the route from gate to drop zone: that distance in metres is your starting quantity.
What it costs
| Item | Typical guide price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Aluminium roadway, installed | £20–£40 / m | HGV rated |
| Heavy plastic roadway | £12–£25 / m | |
| Pedestrian / accessibility mat | £4–£10 / m | |
| Typical minimum charge | £500–£800 |
Guide prices exclude VAT and vary with season, region and site access. Quotes from suppliers are always the real number.
Trackway & ground protection hire across the launch corridor
Local pages for every corridor town, with the same honest ratios and local site knowledge.
Trackway & ground protection hire: questions organisers ask
Do I really need trackway for a field wedding?
If suppliers deliver in anything bigger than a car and the field is grass, plan for it: the marquee lorry alone weighs several tonnes. Some dry summers you get away without it; the years you do not, recovery trucks and ruined lawns cost far more than the hire.
Is an aluminium roadway the same thing as trackway?
Yes: aluminium roadway, temporary roadway and event trackway are the same interlocking panel product under different names. Ground protection mats are the separate, lighter product for pedestrian and light-vehicle routes rather than full HGV loads, so check which one a quote actually covers.
How much trackway do I need?
Measure the vehicle route from the hard road or gateway to where suppliers stop, then add a working pad of 10 to 20 metres where vehicles turn or park. A typical field site uses 40 to 100 metres.
How quickly can trackway be installed?
Crews lay roughly 100 metres of aluminium panel per hour or two once on site, so most event routes go down in half a day. It is usually the first delivery on the schedule, since everything else drives in over it.
Can I hire trackway for just one day, or is it always a full weekend?
Suppliers price the job, not the number of days panels sit on the ground: the quote covers delivery, laying and collection, so a single-day event pays much the same lay-and-lift cost as a weekender. That fixed labour cost is why minimum charges of £500 to £800 apply even on short routes.
