Portfolio: Transport
An artist’s impression of the desiro train
Rolling stock
Richard Johnstone examines the impact of the new fleet
S
cotRail’s managing director Mary travellers. Where we can, we’ve secured Transport Scotland for a fleet of 130 new
Grant says that: “it is a myth that additional rolling stock, but it’s at a pre- rail carriages from Siemens Mobility for
I’ve got a forecourt of trains backed up mium in the UK, and there’s not a train the Ayrshire corridor, “will go a long way
that I don’t bother to bring out.”. mart in Scotland that I can go along to to satisfying some capacity issues that we
She says: “I sometimes get asked, ‘did and say, can I have this, this and this and have, if you were to look at our services
you know Scotland was playing at Hamp- have it delivered by Saturday, I’d love to in total”, as the existing trains “won’t be
den?’ I did, I did indeed, we had every have somewhere where I could do that.” leaving the franchise, they’ll be cascad-
train that we could have out, and we still She added, however, that the recent ing around and utilised on other routes
managed to satisfy all our other weekend announcement of an order placed by and to help with other projects, so we’re
beYONd The heAdLINeS
ROAd
T
he publication of a report by the review could look at road schemes, per- roads will not have a significant effect on
buILdING
motoring group the RAC Foun- haps it is useful to examine the report. climate change so long as wider policy
dation, aiming to bust the myths and It highlights what it calls 11 “prolific measures are introduced alongside road
misconceptions about road building was myths” about road building. Amongst development, arguing that emissions
always going to be met with a strong re- the views that it highlights are that new can be reduced by up to 10 per cent if
sponse from environmental campaigners. road capacity does not simply fill up with road pricing is introduced alongside
And so it was, with the report arguing traffic. The report argues that it creates new roads. It also argues that traffic pol-
that strongly held views on road devel- benefits, as new road capacity will gener- lution is not getting worse, as vehicle
opment have been coloured by personal ally reduce congestion and travel costs. technology has reduced traffic pollution
experiences, popular beliefs, comment in While some entirely new traffic may significantly, although it admits these
the media and propaganda rather than result, the foundation argues this is not improvements have been partially offset
facts, while Campaign for Better Trans- necessarily negative, as users will ben- by increased traffic.
port’s executive director, Stephen Joseph, efit from easier access and journeys, and The report also argues that roads do
said that the RAC Foundation needed to argues that adding new roads on their not occupy large areas of land and are
come up with “real solutions”. own will not lead to extra traffic gen- efficient users of space in comparison to
However, with the plans for the M74 eration if the right land use policies and the railways. Roads carry almost five times
extension for Glasgow already approved, pricing regimes are in place. more passenger traffic than the railways
and the potential that the Government’s Pricing regimes also feature in the and only take up 50 per cent more land,
forthcoming strategic transport projects foundation’s reasoning that building and building roads will benefit low-income
48
| 17 November 2008 | Holyrood magazine |
www.holyrood.com |
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