It's no longer planned to be actual widening but Active Traffic Management instead. This creates extra capacity at a much lower cost by use of variable speed limits, traffic lights on slip roads and hard shoulder running.
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Beeching
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Solid motorway from Apex Corner (where the road can link to the M1) to the Tyne Tunnel with complete dual carriageway from Washington to the Edinburgh Bypass. Also upgrade the A14 from Girton to Alconbury and renumber it as the M11 (the A14 would go back to the Ermine Street route and the western section return to A45). Basically, make the Great North Road the country's premier road once again, and the first choice over any other route north. Until that happens, it's unfinished.
Remember, my house is on the Great North Road's old alignment through Graveley, so I might be a little biased.
That section of the A1 though should really only be used by traffic for destinations between Stevenage and Huntingdon, other traffic should use the M1 or M11, negating the need for improvements to the A1 on that section.
Well, yes, you're probably right, although the M11 is not really a viable option, because of all the problems of the A14. Thing is, I'm a bit of a George Hudson ("Every line must pass through YORK!") so I probably care far more about prestige than anything else, which is a bit silly. I have this burning desire to see the M1, M6 and M11 knocked off their pedestals and the Great North Road restored to its rightful place as the best road in the country. For the same reason, I would like to see the WCML stuck with capacity bottlenecks for the next thirty years while they quadruple the ECML all the way to Grantham, reopen the Leamside, give Darlington an up platform, fit tilt north of York and electrify to Dyce. Does that make me an idiot?
So you'd want another Stoke Tunnel then? The four track section from Peterborough currently ends there.
Exactly, but it's not a new idea. It was proposed in the 1950s, when they planned to electrify the line as far as Newcastle at the same time as the WCML. This got dropped quietly because of budget cuts, and anyway the Deltics could deliver almost as good a performance as the electrics of the day. Welwyn was on the list as well. I'd also reinstate the down slow between Peterborough and Helpston to add flexibility and revive the Peterborough cutting idea (the fast lines would take a dive somewhere around the station and surface near Werrington) to allow crossing movements to pass overhead.
If the ECML was going to be electrified today, would there actually be a business case to extend the electrification beyond Newcastle considering some of the trains terminate there and bi-mode would be available for Edinburgh? I know Beeching wanted major investment in the trunk routes but I'm not sure if this included the section north of Newcastle as the plan may well have been for the WCML to be the primary route to Scotland. One reason the A1(T) most likely won't be dualled all the way from Newcastle to Edinburgh is that an alternative route exists via the M6. That said the last 40 miles to Edinburgh on the A702(T) are quite slow as it's all single carriageway and some people go all the way to Glasgow to join the M8 to Edinburgh.
"Beeching II" - The development of the trunk routes - excluded the ECML north of Newcastle in favour of, oddly enough, the Newcastle-Carlisle line, which would presumably be the route for all Newcastle-Scotland express services. Given that the largest town on the east coast route was Berwick it's unlikely it would have lasted long as a purely local service.
He once said that he could close the line between Newcastle and Edinburgh while "only inconveniencing the people of Berwick-upon-Tweed" (the height of London-centric arrogance) so I can imagine that it was not up for electrification. Anyone from York northwards would have to make a lengthy diversion to get to Carlisle if they want to go to Scotland, and that's a significant slice of the population. Same is true for anybody from Lothian or Fife who wants to go to most of eastern England.
Problem is the M1 between the M25 and M6 is at capacity already - so adding more traffic to that isn't very helpful.
As pointed out, the M11 is a fair distance away so doesn't really help much.
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Askoxford.com defines 'sustainable' as
"able to be maintained at a certain rate or level"
or
"able to be upheld or defended"
so, how do you account for your statement above?
Because arguably both road and air are 'sustainable' on the basis of that definition.
If you mean the environmental element, you may have a point with air travel owing to it's dependency on fossil fuel.
Road transport however is making progress on both electric vehicles and also developing hydrogen fuel cells - which puts the road industry ahead of the rail industry on the basis the electricity used by the rail network will, in large part, be generated from fossil fuels.
Markdvdman
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The only problem with road transport as regards to the 'green' element is cost. Electric vehicles are VERY overpriced and very limited in that very few charging stations are about and time for charging is a joke!!!
Hydrogen fuel cells maybe a point but surely this can go into rail as well anyway? Outside of pushbikes, rail will ALWAYS remain the greenest form of transport, and cyclists utilise rail a lot anyway ironically!
Cars are here to stay for sure due to freedom elements. Hopefully, hydrogen is the way to go.
However, we need a lot more rail paths going forward, or road congestion will get far worse.
The cost financially is far less than the cost to the environment!
I presume that an empty or lightly (10 or less) loaded DMU has better fuel consumption than the two or three cars which people would otherwise be travelling in?
I agree that a full or well used train is probably greener than every one of those passengers driving a car.
If what is being claimed is the environmental angle, then rail services should only be run where they are well used and lightly used services scaled back or withdrawn on environmental grounds?
The current level of car use isn't able to be maintained at the current level long term due to the use of limited resources and also climate change concern so it is not sustainable. Hydrogen is all very well but extracting it uses a lot of energy. It may be that the days of the private car are numbered as it will never be as effecient as public transport so we should start planning for a possible future without the car.
The M11 can easily be accessed from East London. If you improve the A1(T) then you will only end up with encouraging a lot more traffic to use the route and you may find that it soon is at capacity. Baldock to Alconbury would as I say be quite expensive to do and if all it does is increase traffic on the rest of the road so that it can't cope then it's pointless. You could get some extra capacity on the M1 through Active Traffic Management without having to do any actual widening. A high speed line to the North will also likely result in modal shift to rail away from the M1.
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How many DMU's are running around with less than 10 people throughout their entire journey? Naturally, some are pretty empty when they are travelling against the major flow of traffic, or very early/late services. But these are really ECS movements which would have to run anyway, by allowing the travelling public on board at least some revenue is gained.
What's more, what would happen to those few people who are carried on a fairly empty service in one direction, but return on a fuller one? If they can't make their journey by rail they will use the roads, which is hardly what we want.
No, you have to electrolyze the water first into hydrogen and oxygen. This process uses quite a lot of energy so hydrogen is not a good option.
Public transport is actually highly inefficient from a number of perspectives.
It works in certain circumstances (probably <20% of passenger journeys).
It does work for getting people into and around large conurbations - of which I'd say the UK has about 5 - Greater London, West Mids, Greater Manchester, Tyne & Wear (at a push) and Greater Glasgow.
It doesn't work particularly well outside those areas. My commute from Northampton - MK is totally impractical by public transport - let me explain:
I live at the east end of Northampton - the bus into Northampton town centre takes about 35 minutes and deposits me at the bus station, 15 minute walk to the railway station before a 15 minute train ride to MK and 10 minute walk to the office - grand total 1h 15 mins assuming perfect connections to cover a 26 mile journey which I can drive directly in 35 minutes.
The days of the private car aren't numbered - far from it. You cannot force people away from it and public transport simply can't work for the vast majority. What you can do is offer public transport as an alternative for those who want to use it.
Extracting hydrogen isn't straightforward - at the moment, but as ever the more we do it the more efficient we become at it. Your argument seems to be as it's difficult we shouldn't do it - follow that logic to it's logical conclusion and we'd never have developed nuclear power and never moved beyond the horse & cart.
As for your A1 / M11 comments, all I can say is your taking a knee-jerk anti roads line. You clearly don't live in the area or use any of the roads in question. I used to and there would be widespread support in many places along the A1 to it being upgraded, not least because it would save people travelling 10-15 miles out of their way to pick up the M1 on the belief it is a better road to take you North.
New roads just generate more traffic though, the the Baldock to Alconbury section was upgraded you'd be encouraging more people to use that route and put pressure on the section north of Doncaster. The M11 is available from North East London and on the M25 the signs even say "The North via M11/A1" and they wouldn't say that if they didn't want people to use the route.
If there is no solution to the environmental issues then reality may well be that cars are on the way out. The horse and cart had its day, the canals had their day and the private car may well have had its day.
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Only because better methods of transport were developed the car remains at the present moment the best way of getting people from A to B there isn't a better option out there that will persuade people to give up their cars.
That may change if most people can no longer afford cars.
Zoe, you rightly say the horse and cart and canals had had their day but they were replaced with better and quicker technology. The very idea that trains will be the choice of the masses is simply not true. AOwen gave a good account of how long it takes to go on a relatively short journey. You cannot simply confine the motor car to history without thinking for a second how the goods will get to the Supermarket. The local Morrisons in Loughborough is not going to be replenished from the Midland Main Line !
The countries task is to improve Public Transport where rail and bus co-ordinate. However our beloved trains will not co- ordinate, so what chance there! The car will be around for many years yet.
The countries task is to improve Public Transport where rail and bus co-ordinate. However our beloved trains will not co- ordinate, so what chance there! The car will be around for many years yet.
Our current lifestyle are going to have to change one way or another in the future. We will not be able to be so car dependent in the decades ahead, and the whole ethos of long distance bulk road distribution will end up as costly as long distance commuting.
In my view, we will have to live closer to where we work/study, and eat and drink produce that is sourced locally rather than being flown or driven in from the other side of the country or the world.
Whatever is happening today cannot be guaranteed to continue in the future. Who could have foreseen the changes of the ast forty years in 1971? The private car will not disappear, but it will simply not be possible for it to be used as it is now.
In my view, we will have to live closer to where we work/study, and eat and drink produce that is sourced locally rather than being flown or driven in from the other side of the country or the world.
Whatever is happening today cannot be guaranteed to continue in the future. Who could have foreseen the changes of the ast forty years in 1971? The private car will not disappear, but it will simply not be possible for it to be used as it is now.
Electric cars do help with emissions - but not, of course, with congestion. An electric car takes up the same roadspace as a conventional one.
It's hard to see what will get people out of cars - people weigh up congestion and cost of fuel against the journey time, overcrowding and fares involved in public transport. The high fixed costs of motoring make it sensible to use the car once you actually have one.
It's hard to see what will get people out of cars - people weigh up congestion and cost of fuel against the journey time, overcrowding and fares involved in public transport. The high fixed costs of motoring make it sensible to use the car once you actually have one.
The uptake has so far been very slow and the range is quite limited. The electricity also still needs to be produced and this still results in CO2 emissions. There is also the issue of congestion as state above by exile.
Forgive me, but doesn't the rail network have exactly the same issues?
- Dependent on Fossil fuels
- High user of electricity which generates CO2
- Congestion due to physical constraints on the network.
Big difference is that small improvements to the road network are fairly cheap and easy to deliver e.g upgrading a single carriageway road to a dual. Yet with rail we're talking about carving up the Chilterns to build HS2......
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You're assuming (wrongly) that the traffic on the A1 is originating from North-East London.
Once your west of the A10 corridor, using the M11 in preference to the A1 adds a huge diversion to your journey and makes absolutely no sense.
Places like Hatfield and Stevenage would benefit massively from long overdue improvements to the A1.
No, I'm saying that the M11 is an alternative route for to the North if you are in that part of London that's what you would use. If you are in North West London you can use the M1. Public transport is also an option. There is not likely to be a major upgrade between Baldock and Alconbury unless there is a major change of government policy so people should use an alternative route or public transport. If you did upgrade the route it would likely result in more traffic wanting to use it and possibly less people using more sustainable transport. Right now if it's a case of sitting in the traffic or having a fast journey on the train then the train would be the option people would go for.
I'd contest your 'going to have to change' statement.
Compare what was cutting edge in 1971 with what is cutting edge now - technology has moved on at an immense pace.
The big prize is to find an effective way to produce hydrogen.
A car has already been produced which uses hydrogen - the Honda FCX.
http://automobiles.honda.com/fcx-clarity/performance.aspx
It's a 4 door saloon, about the size of a Mondeo with similar performance to a 2 litre petrol / diesel.
So the fuel cell has successfully been produced all it needs is an efficient way to produce the fuel.
Yes, I had a feeling that you would bring up hydrogen! Producing it, and producing it cheaply, may well be a bigger problem than building a car that runs on it.
Even if we suppose that a car running on hydrogen can be produced cheaply, is safe, and so is the fule that it runs on, that still doesn't mean that cars and lorries are going to be as prevalent as they are today.
It's comforting for all of us car owners to believe that we wills till have the indivudal freedom and flexibiltiy that the car gives us, but I think we have to look at this realistically.
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