Chambers demand Forth Bridge rethink
07/06/09 12:42 Filed in: Granite
Chips
According to The Sunday Herald, the Scottish Chambers of Commerce have called
on the government to revert to plans for a wider replacement Forth
Bridge with light rail potential and a motorway approach.
The call seems timely. What is the point of spending billions to get a substandard bridge that is going to provide little net benefit for traffic on day one, let alone having minimal potential for easing greater traffic in the future.
As we pointed out in January, the proposed cut price bridge would be only two lanes in each direction (the same as the current bridge). So the only potential traffic flow benefit will be the removal of public transport which is planned to operate on the existing bridge.
So almost the same amount of traffic as at present will have to squeeze through the same amount of road space as it does at the moment.
If you are spending billions of pounds, the objective should surely be for some improvement.
The call seems timely. What is the point of spending billions to get a substandard bridge that is going to provide little net benefit for traffic on day one, let alone having minimal potential for easing greater traffic in the future.
As we pointed out in January, the proposed cut price bridge would be only two lanes in each direction (the same as the current bridge). So the only potential traffic flow benefit will be the removal of public transport which is planned to operate on the existing bridge.
So almost the same amount of traffic as at present will have to squeeze through the same amount of road space as it does at the moment.
If you are spending billions of pounds, the objective should surely be for some improvement.