1997-style Bonfire of Road Projects with Labour victory?

[AnOrdinarySABREUser]

I would prefer it if NH find they are directed away from facilitating housebuilders with no concern for the surrounding environment and more towards providing modern roads, including improving options for not driving where relevant.

Isn't that asking a bit much of an organisation called National Highways?

You must have missed the memo that the "public highway" is open to everyone.

We shouldn't be worried about the axing of road projects at the moment given that there are far more pressing issues such as the cost of living crisis. However, it is a realistic prospect that Labour and indeed any future government will axe many road projects in the future due to financial reasons, but again, why worry about it so much when there are many other issues to be worried about?

I have no proof or evidence, I'm just suspicious and concerned that's all. Labour have a track record on this, being quite happy to scrap schemes in non Labour areas while keeping their traditional heartlands happy with a few token schemes.

We need specific evidence of this though. I wouldn't be surprised that if the Tories were elected then they would scrap or push back a lot of road schemes too due to the financial situation, but then again they'd probably push harder for some road schemes in order to appeal to the "oppressed" motorists across the country.

I would prefer it if NH find they are directed away from facilitating housebuilders with no concern for the surrounding environment and more towards providing modern roads, including improving options for not driving where relevant.

Perhaps this'll happen in another universe, it seems unlikely that NH will give much thought to pedestrian or cyclists movements affected by their schemes.

Isn't that asking a bit much of an organisation called National Highways?

You must have missed the memo that the "public highway" is open to everyone.

I can't blame Chris for saying as this as a highway in the modern sense is a high-quality roadway designed for motor traffic, not the traditional sense of highways being open to everyone and anyone.

[rhyds]

Lets be realistic, I doubt any government of any colour be it Westminster, Cardiff Bay, Holyrood or Stormont is going to be planning or constructing any big roads or other infrastructure projects for a while due to a combination of

1) Post COVID public finances. There's a massive amount of COVID spending that needs to be paid for. One way of doing this is scrapping future spending on infrastructure projects. This is much easier than cutting day-to-day spending in the run-up to an election

2) Inflation and Interest rates. The big jump in inflation following the Ukraine war and the knock on effects on food and fuel costs have caused project costs to skyrocket both on paper and in actuality. Also interest rate hikes mean the cost of borrowing to fund those big projects is considerably higher than it was a few years ago.

We've also already seen the cancellation of various roads projects with various "spin" put on the reasons why. In England a number of Smart Motorway schemes have been "paused" (read: cancelled), ostensibly as a reaction to their safety, but IMO that excuse is mostly about not letting a good media frenzy go to waste and allowing National Highways Englandshire or whatever they're currently known as to cancel upgrade works without any backlash.

See also Wales' "climate emergency" excuse for cancelling its major roadbuilding projects. The policy has various trapdoors/loopholes to allow projects to go ahead on "safety" grounds, but gives the Welsh Government handy cover to cancel projects that it doesn't really want to go ahead with.

[RichardEvans67]

Could history repeat itself with regard to planned road projects if Labour win the next General Election?

Back in 1997 the incoming government scrapped most road projects that weren't already started or too far along to be stopped. I fear that the same thing could happen again. There seem to be too many schemes planned under RIS that are so bogged down in red tape so aren't far enough developed and would be all too easy to stop. If that happens they probably will never get started again. Many cancelled pre 1997 schemes have never seen the light of day again so there is precedent for this.

Hope I'm wrong but it would be scandalous if this happened. These schemes are too important to lose imo.

Not just Labour. The Tories slashed road schemes in the Early 90. I'm certain of this, because I was made redundant from a job because of it. All the road schemes our office was working on were stopped. One at the preferred route stage, after public consultations. A motorway widening scheme that was at a similar stage. And one in the detailed design stage. I don't know whether Labour cut this even further, but I think by 1997 there would have been far fewer schemes to cut.

It's hard to judge whether this current Labour will cut roads more than the Tories. They said something along the lines of wanting to invest in infrastructure, but that could mean pretty much anything. Even if Labour do cut road schemes (More than the Tories), I think that would be a price worth paying to get shot of this current Tory 'government'.

[roadtester]

I have no proof or evidence, I'm just suspicious and concerned that's all. Labour have a track record on this, being quite happy to scrap schemes in non Labour areas while keeping their traditional heartlands happy with a few token schemes.

So basically this is a scare thread started on the basis of zero direct evidence.

The country is being wrecked by clowns and our public services are in a state of collapse, and we’re supposed to be worried, on the basis of pure supposition or speculation that our already meagre and stalled roads programme may be shaved a bit further, or an incoming government may be more honest than the existing one about whether some schemes in the pipeline actually have a realistic chance of being built.

TBH I suspect this will be about issue number 200 on most voters’ list of priorities and concerns as they go to the ballot box determined to turf out the worst British government in living memory.

[A320Driver]

I’m certainly no supporter of Labour, but despite them cutting back trunk road construction when they came into power, to my knowledge all of the 37 schemes they published in 1998 in the link below, are now built…apart from one.

https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov ... s/map1.pdf

They also delivered further large scale improvements, announced around 2000 and built within 10 years:
M1 J6A-10 widening to D4M
M25 widening to D4M between J16-31
A46 Widmerpool to Newark D2 widening
A453 M1 to Nottingham D2 widening
A1 Dishforth to Leeming upgrade to D3M

They are going to have approximately a dozen schemes to make a decision on, should they come to power by the end of 2024. I really hope Stonehenge is started by then; LTC is 50/50 as to whether they bin it or not.

[Richardf]

I’m certainly no supporter of Labour, but despite them cutting back trunk road construction when they came into power, to my knowledge all of the 37 schemes they published in 1998 in the link below, are now built…apart from one.

https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov ... s/map1.pdf

1 and a half actually. Polegate was only half done.

[RichardEvans67]

1 and a half actually. Polegate was only half done.

That's of interest to me. A27 Lewes to Polgate was one or our schemes when I worked for Bullen Consultants in the Early 90s. There was a link west of the Polgate roundabout, I think called the Folkington link that our scheme made unnecessary, because our scheme connected straight to the roundabout. Then our scheme was cancelled, but the Polgate bypass went ahead, but without the Folkington link.

Many many years later, they were planning instead to dual the bit of the A22 from the Polgate roundabout, to the A27. I lost track of whether this A22 dulling is still going to happen.

[Conekicker]

I would prefer it if NH find they are directed away from facilitating housebuilders with no concern for the surrounding environment and more towards providing modern roads, including improving options for not driving where relevant.

Isn't that asking a bit much of an organisation called National Highways?

You must have missed the memo that the "public highway" is open to everyone.

There's a considerable percentage of NH's network that isn't open to everyone.

[Bryn666]

Isn't that asking a bit much of an organisation called National Highways?

You must have missed the memo that the "public highway" is open to everyone.

There's a considerable percentage of NH's network that isn't open to everyone.

They still have to interact with all the roads that are though. Plenty of barriers to urban active travel happen to be NH's grade separated junctions. The M60 is a classic example.

They might even find that if these barriers were addressed fewer people would be clogging up their motorway by junction hopping one exit. The bigger picture always evades them.

These are small works that would keep plenty of design teams going in the face of cancellation of big ticket projects too.

Acumen, it's not what grows on a teenager's face.

[Conekicker]

You must have missed the memo that the "public highway" is open to everyone.

There's a considerable percentage of NH's network that isn't open to everyone.

They still have to interact with all the roads that are though. Plenty of barriers to urban active travel happen to be NH's grade separated junctions. The M60 is a classic example.

They might even find that if these barriers were addressed fewer people would be clogging up their motorway by junction hopping one exit. The bigger picture always evades them.

These are small works that would keep plenty of design teams going in the face of cancellation of big ticket projects too.

Acumen, it's not what grows on a teenager's face.

With the rider that at many of the points of interaction with the local road/footway network, much of the land where such improvements could be built doesn't belong to NH, it's on the local authority's patch, so not part of NH's budget.

[Bryn666]

There's a considerable percentage of NH's network that isn't open to everyone.

They still have to interact with all the roads that are though. Plenty of barriers to urban active travel happen to be NH's grade separated junctions. The M60 is a classic example.

They might even find that if these barriers were addressed fewer people would be clogging up their motorway by junction hopping one exit. The bigger picture always evades them.

These are small works that would keep plenty of design teams going in the face of cancellation of big ticket projects too.

Acumen, it's not what grows on a teenager's face.

With the rider that at many of the points of interaction with the local road/footway network, much of the land where such improvements could be built doesn't belong to NH, it's on the local authority's patch, so not part of NH's budget.

Which is exactly the kind of pointless silo bureaucracy that makes delivering any meaningful improvements anywhere nigh on impossible.

It's always "someone else's problem" in this industry.

[Conekicker]

They still have to interact with all the roads that are though. Plenty of barriers to urban active travel happen to be NH's grade separated junctions. The M60 is a classic example.

They might even find that if these barriers were addressed fewer people would be clogging up their motorway by junction hopping one exit. The bigger picture always evades them.

These are small works that would keep plenty of design teams going in the face of cancellation of big ticket projects too.

Acumen, it's not what grows on a teenager's face.

With the rider that at many of the points of interaction with the local road/footway network, much of the land where such improvements could be built doesn't belong to NH, it's on the local authority's patch, so not part of NH's budget.

Which is exactly the kind of pointless silo bureaucracy that makes delivering any meaningful improvements anywhere nigh on impossible.

It's always "someone else's problem" in this industry.

I never said it needs a bit of joined-up thinking and some shoe leather applying to various people's posteriors...

[Bryn666]

With the rider that at many of the points of interaction with the local road/footway network, much of the land where such improvements could be built doesn't belong to NH, it's on the local authority's patch, so not part of NH's budget.

Which is exactly the kind of pointless silo bureaucracy that makes delivering any meaningful improvements anywhere nigh on impossible.

It's always "someone else's problem" in this industry.

I never said it needs a bit of joined-up thinking and some shoe leather applying to various people's posteriors...

We can lay the blame square on politics for it too, it's always been about creating little empires for the right faces to fit into, be it local authorities or trunk roads.

Considering all the drivel rhetoric about war on the motorist, no one seems to be interested in providing a fit for purpose road system. No one is winning with the current mess of highway management, misaligned or overkill standards, and lack of long term planning that can't be shattered by electoral cycles.

[Mapper89062]

1 and a half actually. Polegate was only half done.

That's of interest to me. A27 Lewes to Polgate was one or our schemes when I worked for Bullen Consultants in the Early 90s. There was a link west of the Polgate roundabout, I think called the Folkington link that our scheme made unnecessary, because our scheme connected straight to the roundabout. Then our scheme was cancelled, but the Polgate bypass went ahead, but without the Folkington link.

Many many years later, they were planning instead to dual the bit of the A22 from the Polgate roundabout, to the A27. I lost track of whether this A22 dulling is still going to happen.

That dualling got done as part of the A27 Lewes - Polegate improvement package a couple of years ago. Unfortunately the scheme seems to be half wasted as northbound still only has one lane over the railway bridge. It looks like if they had removed the centre-hatching and reduced the width of the barrier on the west side you could probably squeeze S4 along that part: https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@50.82137 ... ?entry=ttu

[jackal]

I’m certainly no supporter of Labour, but despite them cutting back trunk road construction when they came into power, to my knowledge all of the 37 schemes they published in 1998 in the link below, are now built…apart from one.

https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov ... s/map1.pdf

They also delivered further large scale improvements, announced around 2000 and built within 10 years:
M1 J6A-10 widening to D4M
M25 widening to D4M between J16-31
A46 Widmerpool to Newark D2 widening
A453 M1 to Nottingham D2 widening
A1 Dishforth to Leeming upgrade to D3M

They are going to have approximately a dozen schemes to make a decision on, should they come to power by the end of 2024. I really hope Stonehenge is started by then; LTC is 50/50 as to whether they bin it or not.

This is a very good point. It's all too easy to overlook the schemes that either party build.

[Phil]

1 and a half actually. Polegate was only half done.

That's of interest to me. A27 Lewes to Polgate was one or our schemes when I worked for Bullen Consultants in the Early 90s. There was a link west of the Polgate roundabout, I think called the Folkington link that our scheme made unnecessary, because our scheme connected straight to the roundabout. Then our scheme was cancelled, but the Polgate bypass went ahead, but without the Folkington link.

Many many years later, they were planning instead to dual the bit of the A22 from the Polgate roundabout, to the A27. I lost track of whether this A22 dulling is still going to happen.

That dualling got done as part of the A27 Lewes - Polegate improvement package a couple of years ago. Unfortunately the scheme seems to be half wasted as northbound still only has one lane over the railway bridge. It looks like if they had removed the centre-hatching and reduced the width of the barrier on the west side you could probably squeeze S4 along that part: https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@50.82137 ... ?entry=ttu

Please remember that bridges have a thing called load limits - and it could be that the bridge is not capable of taking the extra loading a 4th lane could bring. Yes you can replace / strengthen a bridge but that won't come cheap and the budget for those improvements wasn't that large in the first place.

[roadtester]

I’m not sure why people are assuming schemes are going to be ‘safe’ just because work has started.

Look at the way the Tories dumped much of HS2 just last month with a great deal of spending already incurred on bits that probably now won’t be built.

The Tories have shown they can pull the plug on major infrastructure projects at the drop of a hat.

I’d be far more worried about that than speculation about ‘Labour cuts’ for which there is no supporting evidence.

[Chris Bertram]

I’m not sure why people are assuming schemes are going to be ‘safe’ just because work has started.

Look at the way the Tories dumped much of HS2 just last month with a great deal of spending already incurred on bits that probably now won’t be built.

The Tories have shown they can pull the plug on major infrastructure projects at the drop of a hat.

I’d be far more worried about that than speculation about ‘Labour cuts’ for which there is no supporting evidence.

You're being, understandably, very defensive - but the fact remains that last time Labour entered office, they did shred a large proportion of the planned roads programme, hence the suspicion that they might do the same thing again. That the Tories are quite capable of cutting programmes themselves is of marginal relevance given that it looks very likely that we'll have a Labour government within 12 months of now, hopefully with the Tories consigned to irrelevance for a long time.

[Steven]

You're being, understandably, very defensive - but the fact remains that last time Labour entered office, they did shred a large proportion of the planned roads programme, hence the suspicion that they might do the same thing again. That the Tories are quite capable of cutting programmes themselves is of marginal relevance given that it looks very likely that we'll have a Labour government within 12 months of now, hopefully with the Tories consigned to irrelevance for a long time.

They did, yes. But as I've pointed out upthread, it wasn't the case of Labour binning Roads for Prosperity in 1997. The Conservative Party quite happily binned a huge proportion of the roads programme much earlier, in about 1993.

[Chris Bertram]

You're being, understandably, very defensive - but the fact remains that last time Labour entered office, they did shred a large proportion of the planned roads programme, hence the suspicion that they might do the same thing again. That the Tories are quite capable of cutting programmes themselves is of marginal relevance given that it looks very likely that we'll have a Labour government within 12 months of now, hopefully with the Tories consigned to irrelevance for a long time.

They did, yes. But as I've pointed out upthread, it wasn't the case of Labour binning Roads for Prosperity in 1997. The Conservative Party quite happily binned a huge proportion of the roads programme much earlier, in about 1993.

Yeah, so both parties are pretty much equally guilty. QED.