WELCOME TO THE STATE OF THE NATION REPORT ON TRANSPORT

Transport is riding increasingly high on the national agenda. Previous State of the Nation reports have made the case for integrated long-term transport planning to meet the nation´s economic, environmental and social needs. Industry leaders and economists identify transport as one of the three key issues which will affect the future competitiveness of the UK and the Eddington report argues that the performance of the UK´s transport network is crucial to sustained productivity and a competitive edge.

Despite this, the government appears to have abandoned its Ten Year Transport Plan 2000. Without any sort of national transport plan major projects are developed in isolation. High-profile transport infrastructure projects such as Crossrail and Thameslink Programme may have recently received government approval, but the delivery of major projects from conception to completion takes too long. Without a long-term, integrated transport framework, large-scale projects risk becoming unfit for purpose and unsuited to meeting the future needs of the nation.

The UK has ambitious plans for new housing, eco-towns, and wider economic growth. ICE is concerned at the lack of planning for the provision of transport infrastructure to accommodate these demands. How will we travel to work? How will everyday goods be distributed? How do we balance these increased transport needs with the necessity to reduce carbon emissions?

The provision of effective and integrated public transport networks is crucial to answering these questions, and crucial to enabling people to travel with confidence and without complete reliance on the car.

While ICE envisages that car travel will continue to play a major part in UK transport – particularly in rural areas where large-scale public transport provision is not always viable – a culture of car dependency, and the traffic jams and delays which go with it, is removing the sense of independence that the car once offered and increasing our carbon emissions.

ICE believes we need to redress the balance. Our nation needs a vision for transport, with bold plans to enhance prosperity, offer real choice and reduce car dependency. We need to see proposals like a network of high speed rail lines to reduce short haul air travel; a step change in local public transport to make it an attractive alternative to the private car; and network road user charging so that motorists see the real cost of car travel depending on location, distance and time of day.

This report sets out a 10 step plan to enable effective integrated transport across the UK. I invite government and industry leaders to join me to discuss how we can best take action on the ideas put forward in this report.

David Orr
President, Institution of Civil Engineers