So what does 2020 herald for transport?
The New Year will bring change for Britain’s railways, a green light for HS2 and a greater focus on transport in the North of England The Labour government under Tony Blair had progressed a tram system for Leeds, only to cancel it The good people at Passenger Transport have once again asked me...
Turning declarations into decisive actions
The climate crisis moved up the agenda in 2019 and ambitious new targets were set – 2020 will be about how we achieve them Electrification of a larger bus network looks eminently doable even on the cliff edge timescales demanded by the climate modellers On and on we hurtle deeper into the...
Opening up space for positive change
The changing needs of residential parking in UK towns and cities are opening up opportunities for new sustainable mobility Suburban London residential street with parked cars Across the UK millions of people live on residential streets laid out in the Victorian era. These rows of low rise terraced housing are icons of...
Parties set out their transport policies
It’s encouraging that for most parties, the policies being advanced are set in the context of tackling climate change and air pollution What’s the collective noun for manifestos? An aspiration? An imagination? A deception? In any case, it’s election time so we are awash with them. Every party has to produce one, it...
Another green transport world
If we can join the dots on climate then public transport can thrive. It’s about doing all the right things, and all at the same time Swiss railways are part of a wider ‘Exemplary in Energy’ initiative The weather is losing some of its British reserve. Changing from introversion to extroversion. Records...
The price is right, the time is right
The £28bn a year that the Treasury collects from fuel duty will disappear as electric vehicles roll out. Road pricing is coming Road toll revolution: On December 23, 2017, The Times reported that Britain’s first national pay-per-mile road charging system was being considered by the Department for Transport. I noted no explosion of...
Will LRT ever have traction in the UK?
The slow expansion of light rail in the UK does not seem to fit well with the need to address the challenge of climate crisis Midland Metro The UN Climate Action Summit in New York City at the end of September highlighted the need for urgent and comprehensive activity to address the...
What is the scope for boosting bus use?
Our analysis of the ‘Intrinsic Bus Potential’ of local authority areas in England shows why we need a new deal for the bus “How much have we as an industry put into research and development in the last five years? We’re getting worse, not better, and we have to change that.” These...
Is this the sad end of a 73-year-old story?
A short time now exists for someone to lift Wrightbus out of administration, saving a valued supplier and hundreds of jobs The loss is being most firmly felt in Ballymena, where thousands of jobs have already gone At the time of going to press old established bus manufacturer Wrightbus was on the brink of...
It’s time we talked about modal shift
Modal shift to a revitalised public transport system is the way to deliver our social, economic and environmental objectives Road traffic levels increased by 29% between 1990 and 2018 while over the last five years the number of bus journeys taken has plummeted by more than 300 million Modal shift is the concept...
‘New Rail’ must listen to passengers
It is vital that the post-Williams railway is responsive to the ultimate customer – the people who travel by trains for work or leisure ‘New Rail’ must listen and respond to passengers “Maybe there should not be so many fingers in the pie and maybe a specific person, body, group, that if there...
Six tests for PM’s London-style vision