What are your views?
Perhaps it is a good thing that we live in a world (or more rather, a part of the world) where we are able to travel almost as we please and go to practically anywhere, without any real restrictions except the cost of travel. Be it in the air in a plane, by sea on a ferry or by land in a car, or any other means of transport. However, for every journey someone makes there is still the same things produced: pollution. Even with new technologies such as the hydrogen fuel-cell cars, there is still pollution in the form of Water Vapour. It is controversially and widely debated that water vapour is one of the main contributor to 'The Greenhouse Effect'. Therefore even if everyone changed over to use Hydrogen fuel-cell cars there still be a significant problem of 'The Greenhouse effect'. There would also still be a problem if everyone used an electric car because unless it is possible to find a new, alternative way of producing enough power to run the cars, there will still be pollution produced in the generation of the electricity. Additionally there will be further pollution created in the manufacture of the vehicles.
Is there really a transport problem?
There most definately is a transport problem. Everywhere you go, and almost everywhere you look in the United Kingdom, there is transportation in one form or another. If you look in the sky on a clear day there is a high chance you will see aeroplane contrails. If you look at or travel on most roads in the UK, there is usually some transport in one form or another. In the majority of cities in the UK, but also in recent decade now in towns too, there is a lot of congestion during 'Peak times', also known as Rush hour. This is a result of everyone trying to travel at the same time and creating large traffic jams, sometimes known as 'bottle necks' because it is like everyone is trying to get through a small space all at once. This is much like in a bottle when tipped up-side-down and all the liquid tries to come out, although only a limited amount can escape at a time. Congestion in some places has become so bad, for example in the City of London in 2003, Ken Livingstone (the Major of London at the time) imposed a 'Conjestion Charging' scheme in an attempt to reduce the amount of traffic in the city. Surely this begs the question... can a city, or for that matter, a country have a sustainable transport network if there needs to be congestion charging? The answer is, it cannot.
Do the benefits of motorized transport outweigh the costs?
The main benefits of having motorized transportation are that it is reasonably efficient, fast, affordable and convenient mode of transporting people, goods and services from one place to another. This suits most companies on a large and small scale as well as the individual (driving their cars).
As more and more people are taking to the road and driving on more single occuapancy journeys, this is increasing the amount of pollution being produced. This also increases the risk to human health as there will be more poisonous and harmful gases in the air such as Carbon Monoxide which has been linked to some people suffering from breathing difficulties.
Likewise, with more vehicles on the roads, there will be a greater effect on the environment. One main outcome from having more traffic on the roads is that there will be more animals knocked-down. Also, as more and more vehicles will be on the roads, this will increase conjestion and this usually means that councils, etc. typically choose to build more roads. However, of course this means that some land usually has to be allocated for the construction of the roads. Very often these new roads are built in the form of 'by-passes' and these tend to go around towns and cities; passing through fields and sometimes green-field site. The outcome of this is that the noise from the new roads can cause some animals to move away from the roads and into new habitats. Although the bigger impact from new roads is that the land which these are built is cleared and in this process, some habitats are destroyed.
The present transportation system is a very key part of the country as it enables the movement of people, goods and services throughout the country and the UK. If for example, all transportation (roads, rail, etc.) were removed over-night, the whole country's economy could collapse. This is why it is so to maintain the present transportation network. One way in which the present transportation network is currently being expanded is with the widening of the M1 motorway. This is to allow a greater number of vehicles to travel on the road, especially as the majority of goods is transported around the country by roads nowadays.
Are there any minor (or perhaps major) changes you personally feel could make our present transport system more sustainable?
In my opinion, one thing that could make the present transport system more sustainable is if people drove less often and for shorter distances. This seems like an obivous thing and has been suggested by the government's Department of Tranport... By driving just a few miles a week, if everyone did this, it would still help to reduce the amount of pollution being created in the local area. If this was then rolled out on a national scale it could have a far greater influence to reducing the total pollution caused by transport.
Public transport is something that is widely debated as to whether it is value for money. I can personally say from using public transport for many years, it can be expensive, but more expensive for short journeys. There is a lot that could be done to improve the persent public transport system such as, ensuring that buses arrive at the times which are published on the timetables issued. Public transport is best avoided in extremely bad weather conditions like snow and in these conditions it may be seen as being more beneficial to travel by car. This said, it is not very safe to do so and therefore by using public transport you at least have an excuse for being late to your destination. Overall the trains are much more efficient and punctual than buses.
If public transport was nationalised or at leasts some routes were nationalised this could greatly increase the number of people using it, because it then the costs could be reduced. Although if public transport was subsided by the Department of Transport this could encourage a far larger number of people to use public transport. Better still... as outlandish as it may sound, what if Public Transport was made FREE?
REFERENCES
Larry West (2010). What is the Greenhouse Effect? [online]. Available from:
http://environment.about.com/od/globalwarming/a/greenhouse.htm
(Accessed: 25th March 2010).
Transport for London (2010). Congestion Charging [online]. Available from: http://www.tfl.gov.uk/roadusers/congestioncharging/ (Accessed 26th March 2010).
Department for Transport (N.D) Public Transport [online]. Available from: http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/statistics/datatablespublications/public/
(Accessed: 26th March 2010).
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