Transport Policy: Off the Rails?

Abstract

The organisation and delivery of transport services in Britain have undergone important changes in the last ten years. In evaluating these changes we must be very clear in what ways they represent radical departures from existing policies and in what ways they are merely extensions of trends, even if there are presentational differences. While there have been important changes in transport provision, the basic pattern remains unaltered. Successive right-wing Conservative governments have had little difficulty in working within the framework established or sustained by previous Labour administrations. Any shifts in transport policy are readily explicable by the post-war history of neglect of or indifference to all non-motorised modes and public transport. All post-war administrations have subscribed to the view that the needs of the car must be met, cities destroyed as living places, and planning defined so as to facilitate spatial changes which favour motorised travel against the pedestrian, cyclist and user of public transport.