4. Reducing congestion on the inter-urban trunk road network and in large urban areas is a high priority for the Department for Transport; it was one of the Department's Public Service Agreement targets in the Spending Review 2000.[8] This target has since been put on hold, while a better method of measuring congestion is devised. The Department currently has a target to publish a target for reducing congestion, using an improved measure, by July 2005.[9]

5. According to the Department for Transport, by 2015, total traffic on the roads will have grown by over 30 per cent compared to 2000 levels.[10] Traffic growth on this scale will be a strangle-hold on the urban environment and will cause gridlock on many of the nation's most important strategic routes. A reliable strategic network is key to the efficient movement of goods and people around the country. Although motorways and trunk roads make up just 4 per cent of the UK's road network, they carry 67 per cent of road freight.[11] Urban areas should be busy and bustling places with strong economic centres that attract people from the surrounding area, but severe congestion can damage a city's vitality and prosperity. Research funded by the European Union found that environmental and social sustainability deteriorates in cities if no action is taken to control growing traffic.[12] The modelling found that best results were achieved by a combination of 'push and pull' measures, such as road pricing and improvements in public transport. Towns and cities must remain economically important locations and transport policies should not deter visitors and shoppers. A good balance between a vibrant local economy and flowing traffic needs to be reached.

6. An efficient road network is seen as crucial to the economic performance of the UK. According to a survey by the CBI, over 85 per cent of senior business people believe that investment decisions are influenced by the quality of transport, and almost 70 per cent consider the UK's transport system to be poor. The CBI has estimated that road congestion costs the UK up to £20 billion per year.[13] The Department for Transport has questioned the £20 billion estimate, but has not itself made an official measure of the costs of congestion, other than to suggest that a national road pricing scheme could achieve time savings of £10 billion a year, which could rise to £12 billion when the value of increased reliability is considered.[14] A European comparative study put the costs of congestion on British roads at almost £15 billion per year at 1998 prices; this amounts to 1.5 per cent of GDP.[15] Of the other northern European countries, only France had congestion costs which exceeded 1 per cent of GDP (1.3 per cent). The European Transport White Paper predicted that the costs of congestion throughout Europe would double over the next decade.[16] Broadly, the business community welcomes extra capacity and freer flowing traffic conditions, but is reluctant to pay more for it.[17]

7. Road user groups often make the argument that motorists pay more in transport-related taxes than the Government invests in transport services. Research based on data from the National Transport Model shows that although drivers pay more in taxes than is spent on road infrastructure, the costs imposed by road use are around two to three times the tax payment by drivers.[18] This is because although road transport is convenient and often necessary, it imposes many different costs: the costs of owning and driving a vehicle, road infrastructure costs, congestion, air pollution, water pollution, climate change, land take and change to the character of the landscape, risk of death and injury, and 'community severance'.[19] Some of these costs are borne by the road user, but others are borne by society at large.

8. Many of the wider costs of road use are not included in the price of driving and owning a vehicle. As vehicle efficiency and reliability has improved, the overall cost of motoring has remained at the same level in real terms for the last twenty years.[20] Even in the short period between 1997 and 2003, the cost of motoring fell by 4.8 per cent.[21] In contrast, the cost of public transport has risen substantially. Since 1980 bus fares have risen by 31 per cent and rail fares by 37 per cent.[22] Changing the way people pay for road use should be an opportunity to ensure that the price of road use better reflects the pattern of wider costs.

9. We are pleased to see that the Government is working towards a more meaningful measure of congestion. What we urgently need is a proper evaluation of the costs of congestion and an understanding of the impact congestion has on the UK economy. Until the scale of the problem is properly understood, it will be impossible to gauge what constitutes an appropriate, and cost-effective response. The costs of a road pricing scheme will need to be balanced against a proper estimation of the costs that congestion imposes and its impact on the UK economy.

9   Department for Transport, Autumn Performance Report 2004, Cm 6403 Back

10   RP21A Back

11   CBI (2004) Is transport holding the UK back? Back

12   PROPOLIS Planning and research of policies for land-use and transport for increasing urban sustainability. February 2004. Back

13   The DfT Feasibility Study of Road Pricing notes that the £20 billion figure is based on the value of the difference between actual travel speeds and free flow speeds. The DfT notes that in practice it is not realistic to expect all traffic to flow freely at all times and in economic welfare terms the cost of achieving it would be higher than the value that society puts on the time that would be saved.  Back

14   DfT (July 2004) Feasibility Study of Road Pricing in the UK: A report to the Secretary of State for Transport. Back

15   Nash et al (2003) UNITE - unification of accounts and marginal costs for transport efficiency: final report for publication. Institute of Transport Studies, University of Leeds, Leeds. Back

16   European Union (2002) White Paper on the Common Transport Policy. Brussels. Back

17   RP18, RP18A, RP45.  Back

18   DfT (July 2004) Feasibility Study of Road Pricing in the UK: A report to the Secretary of State for Transport. Annex A, page 64. Back

19   Community severance describes the impact of high levels of traffic on the 'liveability' of a street. Where traffic dominates a street environment, the noise, danger, and physical obstacle of a 'river of traffic', can lower the quality of life and sense of community by preventing children playing outside, making it difficult for neighbours to meet, talk, and walk.  Back

20   Transport 2000 (2004) 'Briefing on the price of petrol and diesel', quoting Department for Transport (2002) Back

21   Parliamentary Answer, Tony McNulty MP, The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport, [166176] 20 Apr 2004: Column 148 Back

22   Transport 2000 (2004) 'Briefing on the price of petrol and diesel', quoting Department for Transport (2002) Back