'Towards a Sustainable Transport System' sets out the Department for Transport's (DfT) new framework to deliver a transport system that supports the economy and reduces carbon emissions. It's the DfT’s response to both the Eddington Transport Study and the Stern Review of the Economics of Climate Change.
It is the first stage of a consultation process to deliver a transport system that meets the key objectives of supporting the country's economic competitiveness and helping to address climate change. It argues that forcing the pace of technological improvements and removing the obstacles to behavioural change will be key to ensuring transport makes a substantial contribution to the goal of at least a 60 per cent reduction of CO2 by 2050.
The document demonstrates how this new approach to planning will be underpinned by long term funding. The recent Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) means that DfT now has a long term funding guideline to 2019, and that spending on transport will be double what it was twenty years previously.
Given the fact that transport spending takes time, investment plans up to 2013/14 are largely set and funding over the next six years will be focused on the most congested routes. Beyond 2014 the document shows that over £20 billion of Government funding could still be allocated to specific improvements up to 2019.
This funding, when combined with further private sector investment, would give the opportunity to make substantial further improvements to the country's transport network. Robust regional input will be sought to allocate this funding in the most productive manner.
The framework sets out a new strategic approach to ensure this funding is put to best use. It outlines how the department will engage with passengers, users, the transport industry and other stakeholders as it develops and implements that process. The next stage will be the publication of a Green Paper and formal consultation in the spring 2008.
Ruth Kelly, Transport Secretary said:
"Our aim is to support people in the choices they make on how they travel or do business, while ensuring that transport plays its part in reducing carbon emissions. Whether it's a company delivering goods, employees getting to work on time, children going to school or a family holiday, a transport system does not work for anyone unless it works for its users.
"We want to deliver a transport system that meets that aim and dispels the myth that as an economy we face the false choice of being 'poor and green' or 'rich and dirty'. It gives us the opportunity to deliver, for the first time, a 'pro-green/pro-growth' agenda for transport in the short and medium term. I urge passengers, motorists, transport users and key organisations to get involved in the consultation, and have their say."
Sir Rod Eddington said:
"I welcome the department's positive response not just to my report but also to Sir Nick Stern's review. Sir Nick was my chief academic advisor and he and I were both very aware of the links between our reports. My Study was clear that the performance of the UK's transport networks will be crucial in sustaining the UK's competitiveness. The Study was equally clear that, to meet both its economic and environmental challenges, the transport sector needs to pay its full costs. I also recommended that, in the long term, the policy making process needed to adapt to meet those challenges.
"It is right that the Department is setting out ambitious plans to implement a new process, involving intensive stakeholder and transport user engagement."
