I have a meeting arranged with the Secretary of State for Transport to discuss constituency transport matters for the return of Parliament in September. Apparently the Secretary of State has olympic duties to attend in August. I will raise with her national road and rail matters. Anyone with a view they would like her to consider should respond to this or send me an email at the Commons.
July 17, 2012
As most car journeys to school are under 3 miles, wouldn’t it make sense to tackle the school run to tackle morning congestion?
July 18, 2012
By tackle, do you mean
(a) use government coercion to ban something, or
(b) use government money coercively extracted from people to subsidise something?
Can you propose a solution involving free choice and voluntrayism that does not involve the implicit threat of violence?
July 17, 2012
Do it here.
Cost of HS2 is 33bn. Electrification 10 bn. 43 bn, and that is an Olympic estimate. We know what happens with government spending.
So given a DLR extension costs 150 million, with a bit of efficiency and economies of scale, that’s over 300 DLR extensions. There isn’t even capacity in the major cities for that type of network.
So you can get a far bigger bang for your buck, for going for light rail if you are forced to spend the cash.
However, given the mess, paying off debt might help. It would pay the deficit for 6 months.
July 17, 2012
Despite the tax on road transport and subsidies on the railways, the public vote with their feet and show they much prefer to travel by car. I spend about 30 minutes a day in traffic jams. I’m sick of queuing up at roundabouts where there should be fly overs. Why does the government increasingly subsidise rail and take from the motorist.?
July 18, 2012
Doug, Governments like rail because they can travel in first class for free. They can dine and do emails. If they had to use cars then they could no longer escape the mess they have created on the roads. We should fight for a single class railroad and watch the differences it would create.
July 18, 2012
The entire organization of the olympics would seem to be a dogs dinner ,we shall see .
July 25, 2012
John
First scrap any ideas of road tolls, A14 and A303 being mentioned recently.
If a private company wants to build a brand new road (on a green field site) like the M6 toll road then fine, but under no account allow modification/expansion to existing roads to be included, as this provision is a government duty we pay for.
Scrap all Road Tax and VED and put cost about 5 pence a litre on the price of fuel.
We would then have a fairer system of payment by use, payment by choice of vehicle you purchase and run.
You can then scrap a whole government department to save money.
Instead of a tax disc (no longer required) get insurance companies to issue an insurance certificate the same size as present tax disc.
When resurfacing all roads remove previously imposed speed humps and chicanes,
Yes they slow the traffic but also destroy your tyres and suspension, let us get traffic moving.
Increase the number of flyovers/bridges and stop the expansion of stupid traffic light systems on roundabouts, which operate 24 hours a day.
That would be a good start.