Click on the headline (link) for the full text.
Many more articles are available through the Energy Bulletin homepage
Are these the world’s costliest roadworks?
The M6 widening – at £1,000 an inch
John Vidal and Dan Milmo, The Guardian
Construction work on a 51-mile stretch of road will cost an estimated £2.9bn, twice Britain’s yearly aid budget to Africa
—
In the pantheon of Britain’s great engineering feats, it remains relatively modest; the widening of the M6 motorway along a 51-mile stretch between Birmingham and Manchester. But in terms of sheer cost, the UK may never have seen its like before.
Every inch of the proposed new road is estimated to cost £897. And when construction inflation has been built in – currently 9% a year – the likely figure will top £1,000. Either will make it the most expensive piece of tarmac ever laid, with the entire project, according to the Highways Agency’s own figures, expected to cost £2.9bn and take three years.
(31 July 2007)
Guardian journalist John Vidal comments in Road to ruin:
We have got our priorities wrong when we find that adding just one lane to a motorway over 51 miles will cost more than £3bn, or £1,000 an inch. That would build at least six big new hospitals. It would give 80,000 NHS nurses a £400 a year rise every year for 10 years. It’s more than the annual budget of Botswana, one of Africa’s most successful economies.
Not surprsingly, the government’s road programme is being kept quiet. Labour came to power in 1997 with a commitment to cut back on new roads but is now presiding over a massive expansion of the network.
At the moment, the entire Guardian article does not display correctly in my browser. -BA
Europeans reluctant to give up cars despite environmental concerns
EurActiv
A majority of citizens believe that the use of less polluting vehicles and public transport should be promoted, but one in five would refuse to use their car less in exchange for better public transport, according to an EU opinion poll.
Although three quarters of European citizens are aware that driving has a negative impact on the environment and on traffic levels in their cities, cars remain the preferred mode of transport for 51% of the EU population, with just 21% using public transport primarily, according to a Eurobarometer survey published on 26 July.
And, even though two thirds of drivers said they could be persuaded to leave their cars at home if public transport services offered better schedules and connections closer to their homes, 22% said they would use their car less “under no circumstances”.
(26 July 2007)
WalkScore and the Great Neighborhood Book
Alex Steffen, WorldChanging
Density, done right, offers one of the most transformative tools in the worldchanging workchest. Not only does good density reduce residents’ environmental impact (smaller houses are less wasteful, shared infrastructure is more efficient and living close to places you want to go reduces driving), research shows that good urbanism can battle the dire social problems with which so cities are beset. Making a good neighborhood better — or starting a struggling neighborhood on the way to righting itself — is one of the most powerful actions any of us can take.
Density is easy to measure, at least in most developed world cities. Livability is a little tougher. That said, there is one pretty convenient stand-in for livability that’s measurable in a whole lot of ways, and that’s how easy it is to walk around.
The places to which you can easily walk are your walkshed. Having a big walkshed, with lots of places you want to go, is one of the best signs that your neighborhood is healthy.
One of the trends I’m most excited about is the convergence of an increasingly sophisticated understanding of what makes a neighborhood walkable with a growing number of technologies that help you get more out of your neighborhood and/or connect more easily with your neighbors. I call the tools spawned by this convergence walkshed technologies.
One of the cooler new walkshed technologies I’ve seen in a while is Walk Score. Walk Score is a Google Maps-based site that lets you calculate how walkable your neighborhood is by measuring the number of potential destination sites in a one-mile radius.
(27 July 2007)
Links and more text at the original. Link for Walk Score.
Related storeis on Walk Score:
Alan Durning at SiteLine
Where can you walk? at the Columbian
MPs urge government to use incentives to boost water freight
Tania Branigan, Guardian
The government should consider introducing financial incentives for businesses to move freight by water rather than road or rail, a committee of MPs urges today.
Just 1% of domestic freight is transported on canals and rivers, despite the fact that carbon dioxide emissions from coastal and inland shipping are 80% lower than those from road haulage, a report from the environment, food and rural affairs select committee says.
It notes that in 2000 British Waterways promised to double the amount carried by water by 2010. But by 2005 the amount had actually fallen, from 4.3m tonnes to 3.4m tonnes. The agency argued it was uneconomic to transport goods by water and warned it would create extra costs.
(31 July 2007)
