On Sat, 01 Nov 2003 11:22:19 +0000, Robert Woolley
wrote:

On Fri, 31 Oct 2003 21:33:06 +0000, derek
wrote:

Last year was the first since (IIRC) 1957 that there was not one inch
of new motorway. This government have been in power 6 years!

[snip]

My journey times are longer now by about20% than they were in 1974
when I first took a job involving extensive travelling despite
significantly better cars.

So despite all this roadbuilding, your journey times have gone up?


All what roadbuilding? The motorways in Scotland were complete (all
but 15 miles) before 1970. That's to all intents and puposes 35 years
ago. As I said it's like driving round the old East Germany. And now
like any old system maintenance is a big source of downtime. Let's
face it every other system that's tried to run using 35 year old
infrastructure has bitten the dust (The Mills, The Mines, The
Steelworks, USW, USW.)

Standards have improved in 35 years so, nowadays any road works even
on the verges and 1 lane is closed down leaving only one in operation,
and then the queing starts big time.

The main road north through Newcastle goes directly past the biggest
retail shopping centre in Europe, the exit empties right on to it. So
Aunt Agatha who lives in Ponteland a few miles away gets tangled up in
with the Beer Lorries going to Edinburgh every time she goes to buy an
M&S pizza.


Have you considered the possibility that roadbuidling doesn't solve
congestion?


Have you thought of offering that argument (Housebuilding is
pointless) to the homeless? Or greater food production is futile, (the
hungry will just eat it) to the starving. Why do you imagine ethernet
networks have increased in capacity 100 fold?

It's not been tried and found wanting, it's been wanted and found
trying.

DG

"derek" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 01 Nov 2003 11:22:19 +0000, Robert Woolley
wrote:

On Fri, 31 Oct 2003 21:33:06 +0000, derek
wrote:

Last year was the first since (IIRC) 1957 that there was not one inch
of new motorway. This government have been in power 6 years!

[snip]

My journey times are longer now by about20% than they were in 1974
when I first took a job involving extensive travelling despite
significantly better cars.

So despite all this roadbuilding, your journey times have gone up?


All what roadbuilding? The motorways in Scotland were complete (all
but 15 miles) before 1970. That's to all intents and puposes 35 years
ago. As I said it's like driving round the old East Germany. And now
like any old system maintenance is a big source of downtime. Let's
face it every other system that's tried to run using 35 year old
infrastructure has bitten the dust (The Mills, The Mines, The
Steelworks, USW, USW.)

Standards have improved in 35 years so, nowadays any road works even
on the verges and 1 lane is closed down leaving only one in operation,
and then the queing starts big time.

The main road north through Newcastle goes directly past the biggest
retail shopping centre in Europe, the exit empties right on to it. So
Aunt Agatha who lives in Ponteland a few miles away gets tangled up in
with the Beer Lorries going to Edinburgh every time she goes to buy an
M&S pizza.


Have you considered the possibility that roadbuidling doesn't solve
congestion?


Have you thought of offering that argument (Housebuilding is
pointless) to the homeless? Or greater food production is futile, (the
hungry will just eat it) to the starving. Why do you imagine ethernet
networks have increased in capacity 100 fold?

It's not been tried and found wanting, it's been wanted and found
trying.

DG

Im afraid countless studies have found that roadbuilding is not the answer
to the problem. People have chosen to travel through the freedomn of choice
that roads and increased wealth have given them, thus perpetuating the
problem.

To continue to build roads will continue the problem. The answer is puvblic
transport, but public transport cannot cater for all journeys and therefore
over time journeys will need to become more corridored. For example go into
any city during the am peak and the tidality of the flow is there to be
seen. IF we were to get all of the people from their cars onto public
transport, or even better living nearer to the workplace, the congestion
would be far less. No doubt you have a big swanky car that has one person in
it most of the time taking up all of that roadspace, when really all most
people need arte a seat.

If roads are expected to last we need to reduce the wear and tear on them
whic in itself has been brought about by the greater use of road transport
(the main damage to roads actually aoccurs from HGVs and PSVs, however PSVs
transport peoiple more effectively). This again needs more of us out of our
cars. Without cars on the urban road network public transport would be
faster and more reliable.

As for the maintenence of roads well normally it involves patching
(completed very quickly around 2 hours) or overlaying (approx 2 days). oNly
on rare occassions is a complete reconstruction carried out, and as I have
said this wear and tear is due to use not age.

I think your justification using ethernet capacity is a bit irrelevant. We
know that building more roads is

a) environmentally damaging
b) increases usage so essentially provides no longterm greater net capacity.

So where do you stop, when the whole country is one great network of
asphalt???

Why not use the technologies to reduce travel more???

To continue to build roads will continue the problem. The answer is
puvblic transport, but public transport cannot cater for all journeys
and therefore over time journeys will need to become more
corridored.

What exactly do you mean by "more corridored"? Most long distance journeys
are already corridored into the rail and motorway networks.

For example go into any city during the am peak and the tidality
of the flow is there to be seen.

Yes, commuting into city centres is probably the only thing that public
transport *can* cater for.

Without cars on the urban road network public transport would be
faster and more reliable.

Indeed it would. However, the current situation we have is that public
transport routes rarely cater for where you want to go. For example, to do
my route to work I would have to get a bus all the way into the city centre,
then another one out again at a different angle - taking well over an hour,
when my destination is just 7 miles away but in a direction not catered for
by the bus network.

We know that building more roads is
a) environmentally damaging

How so? Surely free flowing traffic is using fuel more efficiently, and thus
polluting less, than a traffic jam with thousands of cars hardly moving at
all?

b) increases usage so essentially provides no longterm greater net
capacity.

Usage does increase, however that usage tends to come off local residential
roads, thus making life far more pleasant for residents.
For example, you could argue that the M60 completion in Manchester filled up
to capacity almost on the day it opened, which may be true - but if you look
at the bigger picture and how much quieter local streets in the area are,
surely it's worth it.

So where do you stop, when the whole country is one great network
of asphalt???

Don't be silly, we're nowhere near that. I don't think the motorway network
even takes up 1% of the land in this country, there's plenty of space for
more.

Look at a map of Germany, and compare it to a map of this country. They have
motorways all over the place, yet they still have plenty of countryside to
enjoy.

On Sat, 01 Nov 2003 21:31:32 +0000, Chris Jones wrote:
Don't be silly, we're nowhere near that. I don't think the motorway network
even takes up 1% of the land in this country, there's plenty of space for
more.

Motorways take about 50 square miles of the UK - 0.05% of the total land
area.

Paul Weaver typed


On Sat, 01 Nov 2003 21:31:32 +0000, Chris Jones wrote:
Don't be silly, we're nowhere near that. I don't think the motorway
network
even takes up 1% of the land in this country, there's plenty of space for
more.

Motorways take about 50 square miles of the UK - 0.05% of the total land
area.

Then there are the access flyovers, interchanges, service areas, areas
inaccessible due to presence of motorways, roads that are motorways in
all but name and the area taken up is hugely increased...

--
Helen D. Vecht:
Edgware.

On Sun, 02 Nov 2003 08:40:46 +0000, Helen Deborah Vecht wrote:
Then there are the access flyovers, interchanges, service areas, areas
inaccessible due to presence of motorways, roads that are motorways in
all but name and the area taken up is hugely increased...

In terms of motorway per area Germany has over twice as much. The
Netherlands over 4 times as much.

On Sun, 02 Nov 2003 12:27:14 +0000, Paul Weaver
wrote:



In terms of motorway per area Germany has over twice as much. The
Netherlands over 4 times as much.

Which is an amusing rebuttal of the anti growth mobs lies considering the
population density of the Benelux region.

One would expect no better in the UK given the way the planning system has
been hijacked by vested interests.

The trusts which own great swathes of our cities do not want the value of
their holdings fall, as what happened in the interwar years when over 1.5
million new houses were built in suburbs up and down the country.

Of course this didn't suit labour either as home owners were less likely to
vote socialist, hence the nationalisation of the planning system with the
Town and Country planning act in 1947.


Until whitehall interference in planning is removed by force and handed
back to local authorities nothing will change.

greg

--
$ReplyAddress =~ s#\@.*$##; # Delete everything after the '@'
The Following is a true story.....
Only the names have been changed to protect the guilty.

"Paul Weaver" wrote in message
news
On Sat, 01 Nov 2003 21:31:32 +0000, Chris Jones wrote:
Don't be silly, we're nowhere near that. I don't think the motorway
network
even takes up 1% of the land in this country, there's plenty of space
for
more.

Motorways take about 50 square miles of the UK - 0.05% of the total land
area.


So?????

wrote:

"Paul Weaver" wrote:

Chris Jones wrote:

Don't be silly, we're nowhere near that. I don't think the motorway
network even takes up 1% of the land in this country, there's
plenty of space for more.

Motorways take about 50 square miles of the UK - 0.05% of the total
land area.

So?????

So it makes you look pretty silly when you ranted: "So where do you stop,
when the whole country is one great network of
asphalt???", doesn't it?

"JNugent" wrote in message
...
wrote:

"Paul Weaver" wrote:

Chris Jones wrote:

Don't be silly, we're nowhere near that. I don't think the motorway
network even takes up 1% of the land in this country, there's
plenty of space for more.

Motorways take about 50 square miles of the UK - 0.05% of the total
land area.

So?????

So it makes you look pretty silly when you ranted: "So where do you stop,
when the whole country is one great network of
asphalt???", doesn't it?



Look it up, an analogy. It was an extreme statement of a truth we are ina a
society that would keep paving over green areas to provide faster access.