Transport doesn't create economic growth.
I agree.
It unlocks economic growth when the fundamental ingredients are there.
It's incredibly ignorant to state that investment in sustainable modes of transport doesn't affect things much.
The fundamentals are innovation. I don't like "unlock" as a description of what transport does, I prefer "loosens the shackles". Of course sustainable transport has a big impact, but it follows the growth, it doesn't lead it.
what's wrong with planning ahead instead and saving everyone's time and money
Transport improvements shouldn't lag behind clusters of economic growth by years, they should play a major role during the initial establishment of them.
This can't happen, especially in a country that has no money, because nobody knows where the growth is going to be until it starts to happen.
When there is money, and speculative investment in the hope that growth will somehow materialise, then it can turn out like this:
Built during the Chinese property boom, Forest City is a stark reminder of the crisis in the sector.
www.bbc.co.uk
"I managed to escape this place," Nazmi Hanafiah laughs, slightly nervously.
A year ago, the 30-year-old IT engineer moved to Forest City, a sprawling Chinese-built housing complex in Johor, on the tip of southern Malaysia. He rented a one-bedroom flat in a tower block overlooking the sea.
After six months, he'd had enough. He didn't want to continue living in what he calls "a ghost town".
and everyone's time and money is wasted not saved.
I know about this one because of the bonkers proposal for a new city in rural Suffolk, that even has the same name!
London Olympics architect Steve McAdam says it is "a very good place to locate a population growth".
www.bbc.co.uk
Plans for a new city housing up to one million people in affordable homes are "rational and considered", according to a leading architect on the project.
Businessmen Shiv Malik and Joseph Reeve want to
build Forest City on agricultural land east of Cambridge, between Newmarket and Haverhill in Suffolk.
Architect Steve McAdam is on the board of directors and said the site "seems to be a very good place to locate a population growth".
Nick Timothy, the Conservative MP for West Suffolk, previously described the idea as "ridiculous".
If it were up to the big banks they'd have built a massive car park and urban motorway straight from a nearby airport into whichever location suited their planned development. London Transport proactively coming in and proposing redevelopment of the Isle of Dogs into a public transport-first mixed-use region, and paying for a large portion of it, was a stroke of luck that led to Canary Wharf being a place that's not only successful at efficiently getting large amounts of people in and out of it, but also a place that's quite nice to walk or cycle around in general.
In the event that the market has the money and the power to dictate development, they would opt for the status quo each time - i.e. car-centric out-of-town sprawl that actively worsens the city it's located in. Innovation in business, tech or science doesn't translate to innovation in quality of life for everyone in cities, unless you fancy some half-baked gadgetbahn.
This isn't what happened. The London Docklands Development Corporation played a key role. The Docklands Light Railway was key because it established a link between the "Square Mile" and Docklands, giving the big banks the reassurance that they needed that there would be good communication between the two. It was not about getting the workers in and out, the Jubilee Line extension did that, which is why it was diverted to go via London Bridge. If the London Docklands Development Corporation hadn't existed, then the big banks would have wanted to demolish Hoxton and Shoreditch, to give themselves room to expand, and it that had been refused then they would have expanded in New York instead.
There was a motorway too, the A12 Hackney to M11 link road (remember Swampy in Wanstead?), and a nearby airport, London City.
But all of these were following the innovation in financial services is what came first. None of it would have happened if the banks hadn't needed a lot more office space because they were growing rapidly.
If there were no Park & Ride sites and we instead had a few dozen multi storey car parks throughout the city then the city would be total gridlock most of the time and would be really unpleasant to live in. This would make it take much longer for people to commute to work at the big companies, making it notably less economically productive.
Park and Ride does do that, but it all happened way before Cambridge became a fast growing city. It was the response to increased road traffic generated by 1980s retail. I remember the proposals for more car parking in the old town around that time, including an underground car park under Parkers Piece. Park and Ride followed the 1980s retail boom, it has nothing to do with the Cambridge Growth phenomenon of the last 15 years.
It did really earn the "misguided busway" moniker. But it was investment in public transport for Cambridge, successful or not.
I'm just judging it (anecdotally) on the bus services and frequencies, on the corridors it serves, post-Busway versus pre-Busway.
The misguided busway is an exemplar of bad transport investment. Cambridge is a fast growing city with huge road traffic congestion issues, yet busway usage is well below design capacity and shrinking further.
a large company comes in, invests in a city that already has something attractive about it
In Cambridge, what is attractive is one of the top 10 universities in the world, not the Park and Ride and the Busway. Other globally leading university cities are avaliable.
