>Campaign groups have urged the government to cancel major road building schemes
Campaign groups doing what campaign groups do. This is non-news
MerakiBridge on
I suppose the existing Transpennine and east of London crossing are fit for purpose so we don’t need the new ones /s
Sir_Bantersaurus on
All this country does is scrap things.
HS2? Let’s scrap it and divert money to roads.
Roads? Let’s scrap it and divert money to trains.
Trains? Let’s scrap it and….
Do both. We need to move to more rail overall but roads will still be needed and pretending it’s one or the other is just another excuse to be caught in this perpetual cycle of anti-infrastructure campaigning. We need to stop pandering to groups who want to say No.
The Lower Thames Crossing has been needed for a decade already. The M25 anti-clockwise is in constant gridlock. It’s the busiest motorway in the UK connecting the south side of the river, from where European freight traffic comes from, to most of the rest of the country including most of London. A lot of the traffic wants to join the north circular so the idea of this crossing is to take them off the M25 and lead them onto the north circular without going under the Dartford tunnel.
The counterargument to this is usually that traffic increases to fill the road space available so it’s counterintuitive to build roads to address capacity. I would normally agree with this, I would oppose adding another lane to the M25 for example, but we’re talking about a vital piece of infrastructure in one of the busiest areas of the country that uses a tunnel that predates the motorway it serves. It’s a problem that should have been addressed when the M25 was completed in the late 80s or when they built the QEII Bridge in the early 90s.
We should be moving new traffic onto rail and encouraging more existing traffic onto the network but that doesn’t mean we need to neglect acute problems on vital infrastructure just because it’s a road. Let’s have some nuance here and take each project on it’s own merits.
Careful-Swimmer-2658 on
If only there was a solution to roads packed with commuters. Some sort of way of working from home for instance. But what am I thinking, that’s crazy talk.
anangrywizard on
>The campaign groups have both highlighted huge savings from axing parts of what the Conservative government had billed as the biggest road building scheme in a generation when it launched its road investment strategy a decade ago.
Sorry, are we using the same roads? My journey to work is like driving through the battle of Somme.
I fail to see the huge saving is a good thing…
Perudur1984 on
How can you have a “housing revolution” without the infrastructure to support it?
GMN123 on
If the government can’t afford/won’t fund it themselves, the lower Thames crossing is exactly the sort of thing our pension funds should be investing in. Large capital investment upfront bringing consistent and predictable long term returns.
Square-Employee5539 on
I hope they are at least banking all these projects for the next recession. We have a lot of infrastructure needs. Could be a good way to boost the economy and solve real problems.
Vaxtez on
Governments fail to realise that infrastructure boosts the economy and productivity, so look at the initial cost and just can it instead of building the project and benefits. Its short term-ism
9 Comments
>Campaign groups have urged the government to cancel major road building schemes
Campaign groups doing what campaign groups do. This is non-news
I suppose the existing Transpennine and east of London crossing are fit for purpose so we don’t need the new ones /s
All this country does is scrap things.
HS2? Let’s scrap it and divert money to roads.
Roads? Let’s scrap it and divert money to trains.
Trains? Let’s scrap it and….
Do both. We need to move to more rail overall but roads will still be needed and pretending it’s one or the other is just another excuse to be caught in this perpetual cycle of anti-infrastructure campaigning. We need to stop pandering to groups who want to say No.
The Lower Thames Crossing has been needed for a decade already. The M25 anti-clockwise is in constant gridlock. It’s the busiest motorway in the UK connecting the south side of the river, from where European freight traffic comes from, to most of the rest of the country including most of London. A lot of the traffic wants to join the north circular so the idea of this crossing is to take them off the M25 and lead them onto the north circular without going under the Dartford tunnel.
The counterargument to this is usually that traffic increases to fill the road space available so it’s counterintuitive to build roads to address capacity. I would normally agree with this, I would oppose adding another lane to the M25 for example, but we’re talking about a vital piece of infrastructure in one of the busiest areas of the country that uses a tunnel that predates the motorway it serves. It’s a problem that should have been addressed when the M25 was completed in the late 80s or when they built the QEII Bridge in the early 90s.
We should be moving new traffic onto rail and encouraging more existing traffic onto the network but that doesn’t mean we need to neglect acute problems on vital infrastructure just because it’s a road. Let’s have some nuance here and take each project on it’s own merits.
If only there was a solution to roads packed with commuters. Some sort of way of working from home for instance. But what am I thinking, that’s crazy talk.
>The campaign groups have both highlighted huge savings from axing parts of what the Conservative government had billed as the biggest road building scheme in a generation when it launched its road investment strategy a decade ago.
Sorry, are we using the same roads? My journey to work is like driving through the battle of Somme.
I fail to see the huge saving is a good thing…
How can you have a “housing revolution” without the infrastructure to support it?
If the government can’t afford/won’t fund it themselves, the lower Thames crossing is exactly the sort of thing our pension funds should be investing in. Large capital investment upfront bringing consistent and predictable long term returns.
I hope they are at least banking all these projects for the next recession. We have a lot of infrastructure needs. Could be a good way to boost the economy and solve real problems.
Governments fail to realise that infrastructure boosts the economy and productivity, so look at the initial cost and just can it instead of building the project and benefits. Its short term-ism