China opens 11,000km of Motorway
Discussion
We need to realise our roads are worn out and trunk roads lacking, our roads are covered in potholes and cracks, and investment in new trunk roads vertualy non existent, you only have to drive in Spain, France, Italy or Portugal to realise how bad our roads have become, we are now the third world country. One thing I never got, when driving in other countries you see large signs saying the road was funded by the EU, how come you don't see them in the UK ?
Of course someone will now say they have seen one!
Of course someone will now say they have seen one!
10 Pence Short said:
I would rather spending went properly towards ways of getting people out of cars, where appropriate. Rather than build new roads, I'd rather see us break EU law and spend money subsidising public transport, including the railways.
Too many of our journeys in this country are car and road reliant.
Rail simply doesn't work for people living in 90% of this country and couldn't work even if you tripled the investment. It's a decent solution for a small corner case of the problem space. Roads work spectacularly well in spite of subsidising the public purse. Why we'd pursue such an expensive and moreover generally inadequate solution is beyond me. Green or oil-independence reasons are about all I can think of and they'd be better served with public investment into initiatives on the roads.Too many of our journeys in this country are car and road reliant.
jbi said:
Hackney said:
10 Pence Short said:
I would rather spending went properly towards ways of getting people out of cars, where appropriate. Rather than build new roads, I'd rather see us break EU law and spend money subsidising public transport, including the railways.
Too many of our journeys in this country are car and road reliant.
ThisToo many of our journeys in this country are car and road reliant.
Railways are also money pit's... they cost a fortune of taxpayer's money to build and never recoup the costs during operation, which is fine if you are a cash rich nation like China... but not a heavily indebted nation like ours.
We remain one of the countries where public transport is a business and not a service.
Investment in public transport doesn't mean build more railways but provide service for those who need it.
0000 said:
Rail simply doesn't work for people living in 90% of this country and couldn't work even if you tripled the investment. It's a decent solution for a small corner case of the problem space. Roads work spectacularly well in spite of subsidising the public purse. Why we'd pursue such an expensive and moreover generally inadequate solution is beyond me. Green or oil-independence reasons are about all I can think of and they'd be better served with public investment into initiatives on the roads.
90% of the country is very different from 90% of the population. In 2010 90% of our population lived in cities, and I doubt that has changed much. Railways can work perfectly well, they just need more frequency and better pricing as well as increases in the cost of motoring to encourage behaviours. I would happily see my fuel duty and VED used to subsidise railway use.
10 Pence Short said:
90% of the country is very different from 90% of the population.
In 2010 90% of our population lived in cities, and I doubt that has changed much. Railways can work perfectly well, they just need more frequency and better pricing as well as increases in the cost of motoring to encourage behaviours. I would happily see my fuel duty and VED used to subsidise railway use.
would you be happy at the economic damage this would do as a result?In 2010 90% of our population lived in cities, and I doubt that has changed much. Railways can work perfectly well, they just need more frequency and better pricing as well as increases in the cost of motoring to encourage behaviours. I would happily see my fuel duty and VED used to subsidise railway use.
10 Pence Short said:
The economic damage of the roads being clearer, reducing congestion? Yes.
the economic damage of more white elephant rail construction while taxing the people who would pay for it off the road and thus making the price of everything skyrocket.Do you know anything about economics?
10 Pence Short said:
I would rather spending went properly towards ways of getting people out of cars, where appropriate. Rather than build new roads, I'd rather see us break EU law and spend money subsidising public transport, including the railways.
Too many of our journeys in this country are car and road reliant.
I would rather see public transport users paying exactly the same fuel tax rates as private car users, and the market left to decide. Paying to run thirsty buses empty round the countryside makes neither economic nor environmental sense.Too many of our journeys in this country are car and road reliant.
otolith said:
I would rather see public transport users paying exactly the same fuel tax rates as private car users, and the market left to decide. Paying to run thirsty buses empty round the countryside makes neither economic nor environmental sense.
Only 10% of the population lives in the countryside. I'm more concerned with encouraging the 90% who live in cities to use the readily available public transport and secondly, to grow public transport facilities to help that along.10 Pence Short said:
Only 10% of the population lives in the countryside. I'm more concerned with encouraging the 90% who live in cities to use the readily available public transport and secondly, to grow public transport facilities to help that along.
there are plenty of places that are neither cities nor countrysideotolith said:
Those who live in cities already have decent public transport, which gets too much subsidy as it is.
That's one opinion, and doesn't take into account those travelling intercity. A balance needs to be struck where better use is made of public transport and the road network we already have. Aside from tactical areas with specific needs, I don't see that road building per se is going to solve any problem, be that short term with regards to Keynes style stimulus or long term benefits to the economy.
In another of his "look, isn't China great!" threads, the OP seeks to suggest that the UK is somehow doing something wrong because, unlike China, we're not building thousands of miles of new roads. We're not in as backward a position a China and our road network is mature and well developed. The overall problem isn't the road network, but the sheer number of people wanting to use it at the same time and place and the way that we organise that in conjunction with our under used public transport network.
rover 623gsi said:
10 Pence Short said:
Only 10% of the population lives in the countryside. I'm more concerned with encouraging the 90% who live in cities to use the readily available public transport and secondly, to grow public transport facilities to help that along.
there are plenty of places that are neither cities nor countrysideHowever, stray away from that, and suddenly it's a different matter, and journeys like my commute, which is 18 miles and takes typically 45 minutes, become more like 2 hours door to door with Public Transport.
So, I 'lose' 2 1/2hrs each day if I use Public Transport.
It also costs £9 vs about £4 in fuel, and I can leave work when I want, and not be tied to a timetable.
(If I leave after 6 then the 2 hrs becomes 2 1/2hrs)
All this in an area 8 miles from Glasgow City Centre.
When I heard that train fares comprise only 1/4 of the costs of running a railway, the rest being subsidy,
then I do think we are pissing money down the drain on yet another mad Socialist scheme to make us all 'equal'.
I suspect much of the congestion experienced in cities would vanish overnight if Bus Lanes and looney one way systems were removed, and traffic flow improved, who knows, pollution might even go down as well......
10 Pence Short said:
In another of his "look, isn't China great!" threads, the OP seeks to suggest that the UK is somehow doing something wrong because, unlike China, we're not building thousands of miles of new roads. We're not in as backward a position a China and our road network is mature and well developed. The overall problem isn't the road network, but the sheer number of people wanting to use it at the same time and place and the way that we organise that in conjunction with our under used public transport network.
.Yes, China is far better than UK now.
I would say that UK are in the "backward " position as you call it.
vette
jbi said:
In 2012 China has opened 11,000km of motorway, making a total of 90,922km altogether. Just 20 years ago China had no motorways at all.
To put that in perspective... the ENTIRE British network totals a paltry 3,555km
Obviously China is a vastly larger country than the UK, but it does show where other countries are investing their money in infrastructure, we are pissing it up the wall in welfare payments.
China... 10% GDP growth a year...
Britain, barely 1%
90,000km of roads between 11,000,000,000 people as opposed to 3500km of roads between 65,000,000 people. And they have plenty of (near) slave labour to build them!To put that in perspective... the ENTIRE British network totals a paltry 3,555km
Obviously China is a vastly larger country than the UK, but it does show where other countries are investing their money in infrastructure, we are pissing it up the wall in welfare payments.
China... 10% GDP growth a year...
Britain, barely 1%
But guess who has more KM of road per head of population.
China is one step away from the stone age in most of its areas, so it is pretty easy to improve its GDP, whereas the UK is on the downward spiral of its post-empirical glory, and things are only going to get worse.
Have a look at the history of 'empires' over the last 5 millennia. Every single one has crashed and burned soon after reaching its glorious peak. We reached our peak several decades ago, when 'the working man', the work horse of the populace, the back bone that the empire was built on, decided it wanted to become 'middle class'......
King Herald said:
90,000km of roads between 11,000,000,000 people as opposed to 3500km of roads between 65,000,000 people. And they have plenty of (near) slave labour to build them!
But guess who has more KM of road per head of population. ;
China has 1.3 billion people not 11 billion... lol But guess who has more KM of road per head of population. ;
Basically china's motorway per capita isn't far beyond the UK and if current rates are maintained will pass us in the next few years.
Even more interesting is comparing the UK to Germany which has more than double the motorway mile per head and double the motorway length per square km of land.
UK: 3,555km (60.41 per capita) (15.46 per square km)
Germany: 12,363km (149.97 per capita) (34.63 per square km)
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