Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Gridlock at 3pm..

Except if you live down here in the south, Southern Rail have been on strike for the last three days which has made the roads a nightmare.

I'm with you, I never drive in this country if I can avoid it. My annual 3 weeks or so driving abroad just reinforces this.

Went to South Wales a couple of weeks ago. Two and a half hours from Luton to Hemel Hempstead! I think there's an area that extends to about 25 miles outside the M25 that's always going to be very congested. Those nice clear journeys are the exception rather than the rule. I'm fighting back. Just put the mudguards back on my Dawes Galaxy and pumped up all our bike tyres! As for the Morgan, there's some lovely empty roads out there as long as you keep off the travel routes. And I'm definitely staying in the UK.

Indeed, my first run cost an extra £0.50 or something similar. The next time I was looking to see whether the charges had risen, only to find no £ on road signs and then no booths!
The fifth (?) crossing wasn't so good, with a group of Morgan owners. Half way across there was a dropside Transit on the hard shoulder. Ahead of it a police vehicle which had overtaken us as we passed Glasgow airport. Both Officers peering over the bridge parapet to the depths below... Sad.

Stop HS2 - put all that money into current rail infrastructure expansion/repair would be a good start...

Nearly bought a cottage near Sligo years ago Robbie. Just along the road from a fellow radio amateur.

I never get the argument for rail. Maybe if you are a london commuter or someone who lives in a city centre and only ever goes to other city centres but for the very large majority of the population , trains are at best irrelevant.

If I wanted to make the journey I moaned about and do it by train I would have to drive 20 miles to the station and pay to park my car, then take the train to the nearest station before hiring a car to get to my destination. The journey time would be maybe 90 mins in the car plus 5 hours on the train so no time saving compared with driving. The cost would be £70 plus parking plus car hire - maybe £120 all in ? And I would still have to own a car with all the standing expense that involves.

But with the car I can travel when I want and if the road system was in decent condition I could do the journey in half the time.

The reality of life is that people work for and want the personal freedom that comes with their own transport and not to be forced into public transport. This country is a democracy - its the governments job to give us what we want, not what the current political fashion thinks we should have. So stop wasting money on rail - HS2 alone would finance the building of 3300 miles of completely new motorway or add an extra lane to 10,000 miles. That would more than double the existing motorway network. HS2 is madness!

I agree that HS2 is a waste of money, but it's not true that trains are irrelevant, they carry ever-increasing numbers of passengers, far more than ever they did. Certainly the system is London-centric, but given that over 60% of all railway journeys taken either start or end at a London station, that's hardly surprising.

When the motorway network was planned in the 1960s and being built we had a population of 52 millions.

There were about 7 million cars and light gods vehicles on the road.

Now we expect 66 millions in 2020 with more than 35 million vehicles!!

We are all far more prosperous with money to spend going places and we all expect to be able to do what we want without considering the consequences.

So not really a surprise that we have gridlock at every holiday time.
Too many people with too many cars and light goods vehicles.

(All figures from UK Government Websites)

Peter

One problem with developing an integrated.transport system is that car transport is paid for up-front. You have to pay insurance, road tax, depreciation and the price of the car (whether on finance or not) before you turn a wheel, irrespective of the number of journeys or miles travelled (ok, there's some small costs involved in higher mileage for insurance and depreciation). Fuel costs are the only direct mileage related cost.
As for rail, just look at where rail used to reach before the cuts to its' infrastructure.

I remember that trip so well Graham, we were all rather ashen faced after that. I think it took at least 2 cups of tea and some nice cake in that cafe overlooking Faslane to recover.