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Focus Summer 2001 - Menu - Index - Previous
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The Mayor Of London's Draft
Transport Strategy
The Croydon Society Response
In his manifesto. Ken Livingstone promised
to draw up a transport strategy "to modernise and integrate
all of the elements of London's transport network - tube, roads,
railways, buses. taxis and waterways" . He has now produced
a Draft Transport Strategy to fulfil that manifesto commitment.
The Draft Transport Strategy puts much more
emphasis on maintaining our existing transport system than we
have seen in the past with more money both for maintenance of
roads and the public transport system. Bus, underground and national
railway services will be improved. Money will be spent to encourage
walking and cycling. It is considered that there is little scope
for road building. Nevertheless. the construction of the Coulsdon
Inner Relief Road is included in the Strategy . However, there
are a number of major projects which remain under consideration
in the Strategy which are expensive by comparison with maintenance
of the existing system. Judging by the correspondence we have
had with London Underground on the East London Line extension,
we would not expect these projects to reduce traffic congestion
- we would, however, expect them to generate enough new travel
to risk becoming overloaded within a few years of opening.
We find this credible because we have noted
that the Wimbledon branch of Tramlink is particularly busy, yet
there appears to be no reduction in traffic congestion on the
Croydon - Wimbledon corridor and only a small reduction in use
of parallel public transport services.
It is acknowledged that Transport Strategy
needs to be consistent with Planning policies, needs to encourage
Economic Development and needs to discourage atmospheric pollution.
However, any Transport Strategy for London needs to be consistent
with Transport Strategies in the Home Counties if it is to be
successful, yet there is no mention of the transport strategies
that are being applied outside London.
Besides improving public transport, there
are two proposals to reduce traffic congestion. The first is
to improve the organisation of road works so as to reduce their
disruptive effect on traffic flow. Should it be successful, it
should help to improve the reliability of bus services as wen
as car journeys. The second is to introduce "Congestion
charging" for Central London. It involves charging £5
per vehicle per day to enter a defined area of Central London
between 0700 hours and 1900 hours on Monday to Fridays. It is
intended that buses, taxis. motorcycles and certain other vehicles
will be exempt while residents of the area win be charged 50p
per day. Implementing this proposal will result in a reduction
in traffic in Central London but is likely to cause some relocation
of employment. The Draft Strategy suggests the reduction in traffic
volumes in Central London is not likely to be more than 15% which
means that it will be small in the Inner Boroughs and will not
have any measurable effect in the outer Boroughs.
The general level of car use throughout Greater
London is likely to increase because the car is generally faster
than public transport on door-to-door journey time and for the
motorist the incremental cost of using the car for most journeys
where he does not have to pay parking charges is significantly
cheaper than public transport travel. The potential increase
in car use would be even higher but for those motorists who can
travel at nil incremental cost by public transport either because
they are Travelcard holders or they are pensioners with Freedom
Passes. This still means that congestion is likely to get worse.
At the same time, the policies being advocated for public transport
- increased services and fares freezes - are merely likely to
increase public transport usage by existing public transport
users.
Current planning policies aim to retain neighbourhood
shops but are failing because too many people choose to shop
in town centres or out-of-town. For motorists, one of the factors
which determine their choice is that the incremental cost of
car travel is very low. Bus travellers generally pay the same
fare to local shops, town centre shops and available out-of-town
shops. Current planning policies also aim to encourage people
to work locally but are failing because people find housing they
like better outside the immediate locality. Improving public
transport and reducing the price together with a reduction in
traffic congestion is likely to increase the length of the journey
to work thus making the community more dependent on the transport
system.
There is no mention of school transport in
the Mayor's Draft Transport Strategy. We find this incredible.
We all know that traffic congestion is much worse during the
school term than during the school holidays. Children travelling
to and from school are generally the most expensive passengers
for public transport companies to carry because their numbers
determine the number of vehicles owned and they only travel for
nine months of the year. It should be possible to co-ordinate
education policies and planning policies with Transport Strategy
to reduce the volume of educational travel thereby reducing traffic
congestion, the cost of providing educational transport and atmospheric
pollution all at the same time.
There is a policy of optimising the road network
to maximise the number of people, rather than the number of vehicles,
travelling. There does not seem to be an equivalent for the public
transport network. The uniform London-wide flat fare for buses
is liable to undercut fares on parallel Underground and National
Railway lines. There are already parts of London where buses
tend to overload at a time when the parallel railway has spare
capacity. Moreover, the current coarse zonal fares structure
encourages people to make longer journeys than they would with
a graduated fares structure and is part of the cause of the overloading
of public transport.
We are disappointed with this Strategy. The disincentives to
use of motor vehicles are not sufficient to divert travel to
other modes whereas the incentives to travel by public transport
appear to be sufficient to generate much new public transport
travel. This means we cannot expect any reduction in traffic
congestion. Moreover, we expect an actual increase in atmospheric
pollution because of the greater provision of public transport.
We do welcome the commitment to improve the organisation of road
works so as to reduce their disruptive effect - - it is, however,
a commitment which should not be necessary because road works
should have always been organised in such a way as to cause the
least disruption possible to travellers.
We have not answered the specific questions as they require complex
answers but we trust our views will be seen as a constructive
contribution to the transport debate.
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