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DTp roads plan protest
Page 8
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• More than 4,000 demonstrators marched between the Department of Transport's headquarters at Marsham Street and Hyde Park last weekend to protest against DTp plans to build 65km of urban highway around London.
The proposals, contained within the four London Assessment Studies, are designed to relieve congestion in East London, West London, on the A23 corridor in South London and on the A205 South Circular. The DTp estimates that the roads will cost up to 23.5 bil lion to build. Transport secret ary Paul Channon is expected to decide by Christmas which of the proposals to proceed with.
The pressure group All London Against Roadbuilding Menace, which organised Sunday's demonstration, claims the proposals will jeopardise 250 schools and 5,000 houses in London: "We must have a more imaginative and coordinated approach to easing London's traffic problems," says ALARM, "one which looks at all modes of transport including buses, tubes and rail as well as traffic management."
ALARM claims that largescale construction of new roads will simply increase the volume of traffic; the DTp and British Road Federation both disagree. The DTp claims its proposals will be "putting traffic onto a purpose-built road and taking it away from unsuitable streets, which can be returned to the local people", 171RF says: "The theory that new roads simply fill up with traffic seems to be based either on the M25 or on roads that only feed into other inadequate ones. The M25 is a special case, A bypass to a conurbation of seven million should never have been built to the same standard as the motor way linking Wigan and Liverpool . the Rochester Way Relief Road removed a bottleneck between two already improved sections of road, so traffic flows are now substantial — but it doesn't clog up."
ALARM's supporters, which include the Conservativecontrolled London Boroughs Association, want the London Assessment Studies abandoned before the options for action become firm proposals.
Transport Minister Peter Bottomley says the road proposals will reduce London's road casualty figures. In the area around the Rochester Way Relief Road accident levels have fallen by 30% since the new road was opened.
The CBI has called for an extra £1 billion to be spent on new roads in the South East, including a Home Counties orbital route.