Some of you may be old enough to remember the when John Prescott tried to bring in a new generation of tramways and light rail into UK cities.
You can:
- Read what the Commons Transport Committee concluded on 23 March 2005
- Read the Government’s response of 12 October 2005
….and judge for yourselves.
The Committee recommended: “The Department [for Transport] must build up its own expertise on light rail, and share that expertise with promoters.”
Has it? How do things look over 20 years later?
The Committee recommended: “The Department must give clear guidance about the circumstances in which it is prepared to consider light rail schemes.”
Now this they haven’t done – neither did the previous governments. One of the big problems has been capital funding as inevitably county councils and later combined authorities had to get central government backing in the face of very limited guidance and even fewer resources with austerity hitting. With devolved tax-raising powers similar to other countries, this would be far less of an issue – continental Europe (eg Germany) showing how it can be done. But that also means having the supply chain and skills and careers infrastructure in place. Which the UK does not have.
The Committee Recommended: The Department must urgently reconsider the contribution utilities make to the diversion of their services. Their contribution should be high enough to deter them from demanding unnecessary works [which has been a huge problem for Cambridgeshire County Council in expanding cycling infrastructure]. In particular, promoters should not be expected to bear the bulk of the cost of locating infrastructure belonging to utility companies.
The Committee also recommended DfT work with UKTram – I think there’s something to be said for local government and the Combined Authority doing similar as well – if only to familiarise staff and councillors with the essentials.
It’ll be interesting to see if these issues are covered in the Mass Transit Task Force’s report.
Remember the ten year transport plan?
You can browse through a copy of the White Paper archived by National Archives here
The big bold claim was that the Government was going to deliver:
“…up to 25 new rapid transit lines in major cities and conurbations, more than doubling light rail use.”
Above – Transport Ten Year Plan (2000) HMSO, p6
“So, how many have we got up and running?”
Not 25. We’re still in single figures for England according to UK Tram
Which means that we’re still a long way off of that target.
It will be interesting to see what the Mass Transit Task Force come up with – mindful that The Budget is eight days away. We’re also waiting for the Cambridge Mass Transit Study to be published as well. Given that the next Combined Authority Transport Committee Meeting to sign off the final version of the draft Local Transport Plan is on 04 November 2026, it might be useful to have both before the CPCA Board votes to send it through to the Transport Secretary. It should be released by the end of the year, although don’t be surprised if it slips into early 2027.
In the meantime I’ve been trying to break up bouts of despondency and fatigue by picking out things for future blogposts or action. Not easy when all your head wants to do is crash on a pillow because of brainfog.
One of the recent ones I spotted was this on the economic impacts of light rail investment, which I blogged about here
Cambridge as the busway capital of the UK?
BBC Cambridgeshire featured the recent busway news here. In a nutshell we have:
- Cambridge – St Ives running since 2011 but it was delivered overbudget and several years too late. The massive increase in costs led to a longstanding legal battle that was settled out of court at the last minute. Furthermore St Ives East & Needingworth county councillor Cllr Dr Alex Bulat for Labour was scathing about the state of services and looming service cuts. It’s worth watching her speech in full here
- Cambourne – Cambridge busway: recently approved by the Transport Secretary
- CSET – Cambridge South East Transport from Addenbrooke’s to the A11, which is now at Public Inquiry stage, although the objections are striking.
- Waterbeach – Cambridge busway – county councillors recently approved a motion to apply for planning permission from the Department for Transport. Another public inquiry looms.
Couldn’t councillors make use of the underused bit of the old A1307 (the old A14 route) to extend the busway from St Ives Busway stop to Huntingdon Station?
That could be one of the additional spurs to create additional capacity in rush hours mindful that this was the original plan a quarter of a century ago.
Above – the proposed Cambridge to Huntingdon Guided busway. Have a read of the 2003 consultation leaflet here. How does it read today?
I wrote more about those old proposals here, the Huntingdon A14 bit being dropped – presumably because of cost. With almost all of the through-traffic now going along the A14/A1 section completed at a cost of £1.5billion there should be a relatively traffic free portion that could serve Huntingdon Railway Station, Cambridgeshire Constabulary’s HQ, and Hinchingbrooke Hospital and the business park behind it. Which would be splendid for anyone working at the hospital (assuming Stagecoach provided the services)
One for the Combined Authority?
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