Is Chunnel sunk?
Page 5
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
1E CHANNEL TUNNEL has sprung a leak, with cold water being lured on the project by Dover Harbour Board and by Government lviser Sir Alec Cairncross.
Sir Alec's report was pubbed by the House of Cornons transport committee as closed for press this week, in ne to prepare Transport Secrery David Howell for his exacted policy announcement Ixt month, and the Dover HarJur Board predictably pulled ) punches in its opposition to e scheme.
In its final report to Mr Howell, e Harbour Board says that fern will continue to provide a leaper, more flexible, and safer iannel crossing than any fixed and that they will provide ore jobs.
It lays particular stress on the ifety problems which it assoates with a seven metre rail tinel, the minimum necessary take vehicle-carrying trains. Loading and unloading )eeds would make it necessary ir vehicles to travel on the ferry ains without lashes or chocks, at the forces to which they are Jbjected are similar to those 'hich apply on ferries, and they ways have lashes.
The Board says that the curint proposals do not provide Jfficient fire safety. It suggests at fire-fighting teams would ave difficulty in reaching a urning train, and adds that the ralkways on the trains would be locked by passengers.
It insists that profit must never e put before safety when buildig a tunnel, and says it is vital let any tunnel should have pasangers and vehicles separated y fire-resistant barriers, and for safe standard of ventilation to be provided in the tunnel.
This would add to the cost of a tunnel, and the Board contrasts this with the growing efficiency of the ferry services from Dover principally, but from other ports too.
It says that larger and faster ships can be operated to meet growing demand, and that the newest vessels are also less prone to delay in stormy conditions. Future developments will lead to more efficient propellor blades being fitted to ferries, and this, in turn, will reduce operating costs further.
Future traffic levels, according to Dover, will be met by ferries up to the year 2010 at least without an appreciable increase in the number of vessels serving the port, and it argues that the rate of return on investment will be many times greater than for any fixed link.
For ferries, the rate of return is 15 per cent, or ten per cent if ferry operating costs were even to rise by 25 per cent, whereas the best rate of return for a fixed link is five per cent, according to the Board. The high capital costs of a tunnel or other fixed link would demand a reduction in the number of jobs in South-east Kent, according to the Board, and a twin-track tunnel could result in a net loss of 2,000 jobs.
Backing up the Dover report, Oxford University Transport Studies Unit director Dr Phil Goodwin warned that price competition from ferries would further undermine the chances of a fixed link.