The contractor secured the area 7 East Midlands regional deal against six rivals.

It will replace the Aone+ consortium, which covered the area for seven years in a deal understood to be worth around £420m after a two-year extension.

Under the new regime Amey is understood to be in line to win routine highways maintenance for up to 15 years.

Separate contracts are expected to be let for capital delivery works, design and specialist support services in a return to a more traditional delivery approach after over 15 years of MACs and ASCs, which put contractors in the driving seat to manage the delivery regime.

Area 7 comprises 79km of motorway and 428km of trunk roads in Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Rutland. It includes stretches of the M1, M69, M6, as well as the A1, A14, and A46 and is one of the busiest network areas.

The award means Amey is now operating across East Anglia and the Midlands in areas six, seven and eight.

Highways England questioned its delivery regime more than a year ago when bids from contractors for four ASC regions came in too low to deliver the scale and quality of service expected.

This prompted Highways England first to announce its would pilot Area 7 with an in-house management approach before later deciding the other areas up for bid – 1, 2, 13 and 14 – would come under the new management regime.

A Highways England spokesman said: “This will enable us to take more ownership of investment decisions and to increase our intelligence on local factors that influence where work is needed.

“By directly engaging suppliers we will help drive down cost and waste, providing the best possible value for money for taxpayers.”