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No Piecemeal Solutions for Transport I.o.T. President

18th October 1963
Page 87
Page 87, 18th October 1963 — No Piecemeal Solutions for Transport I.o.T. President
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

I T is no use prescribing solutions for individual transport problems, said Mr. Keith Granville, in his presidential address at the inaugural meeting of the 1963-64 session of the Institute of Transport on Monday. We must prescribe a solution for transport as a whole, a nation-wide attack on the problem of what to do in the late 1970s and early 1980s: we must have a long-term plan, worked out in detail, taking account of every possible conceivable facet of the problem.

Mr. Granville suggested that the Government should co-opt the best brains in the country to examine the problem and draw up the plan. Such a group should consist not only of transport men, he said, but men who have real knowledge and proven ability in other directions—a group of a dozen or so brought together, very frequently, to study the situation and to evolve, in conjunction with the existing transport organizations, professional bodies and Government departments. a uniform plan for the longterm development of transport in this country. ... a Beeching was found to deal with the railways—another, or perhaps several, could surely be found to deal with transport as a whole.

The group's task, continued Mr. Granville. would be essentially to evolve an overall pattern of transport designed solely to ensure that the nation as a whole did not get bogged down and choked by its own excess of energy in transport. Without such a long-term plan. he said, we would face difficulties in transport of immense proportions in the next 10 to 20 years for which our successors would be unlikely to forgive us.

In opening his address. Mr. Granville commented that last year his predecessor had referred to the fact that never before had the winds of change blown more strongly throughout the transport industry than at that moment. If that were true then, said Mr. Granville, it must be even more true today.

An outstanding indication of change in the pattern of transport had resulted from the Beeching Report, he said, which was undoubtedly full of wisdom and foresight.

Referring to the proposed Channel tunnel, Mr. Granville expressed the view that many of us would undoubtedly have expected a final decision on this to have been taken by now. It is more than likely, he said, that demands of trade would require a combination of many forms of transport across the Channel to serve the different requirements which would continue to exist. The view could be taken that by the time a permanent W2y) was built under the Channel the

economies of air transport vehicle carrying, particularly on the deeper penetration routes, would have developed sufficiently to make them fully competitive with other forms of cross-Channel vehicle carrying.

On the theme of road development, Mr. Granville said that those who had seen the investment programmes in other countries must feel that, in spite of great strides that have been taken in the past few years, we were falling short in this requirement ... and there was no doubt the time taken to construct comparable road developments in some countries in Europe, and most certainly in the United States and Canada, appeared to be far more rapid than was the case in the United Kingdom.

Excessive delays to road haulage vehicles had been estimated to cost no less than £10m. annually in the West Midland area alone, said Mr. Granville, and congestion through bad or inadequate roads was costing the road haulage industry around £100m. a year—now. "What is it going to be like by 1970? Worse, what is it going to be like in 1980?", he asked. Of course, he continued, many organizations in the industry, and the Ministry of Transport itself, had looked at this problem and the current expenditure on roads was designed to alleviate it.


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