Britain: An official handbook > 1959

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BRITAIN: AN OFFICIAL HANDBOOK
then, annual authorisations for new road works have been increasing rapidly.
In 1955-56, road schemes were authorised which will ultimately cost the Exchequer
£28 million; in 1956-57, new authorisations totalled £34 million; and in 1957-58,
they were an estimated £66 million. In July 1957, it was announced that road works
costing a total of £280 million would be authorised for the period 1958-59 to
1961-62; this is the largest programme of road construction undertaken in Britain.
All these figures include provision for road works in Scotland but not the comple¬
mentary expenditure by local authorities.
The Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation has explained the plan of campaign
for the road programme. First, to construct as quickly as possible the initial stage
of a national network of modern trunk routes; these will be through routes, in
many cases confined to motor traffic only. Secondly, to clear away the worst bottle¬
necks in urban areas and thus to give free outlets from the big cities and from
other main sources of traffic to the trunk routes. Thirdly, to press forward with the
maximum amount of smaller road works all over the country. The Minister has
also announced his intention to give priority as the programme develops to five
major routes: a trunk road from London to Newcastle, based on the Great North
Road; a motor road from London to Birmingham and Yorkshire; trunk roads
from London to the south-east, by-passing the Medway towns, and Maidstone
and Ashford; a road from the industrial Midlands to the South Wales ports; and
a road from London westwards to London Airport, the west of England and South
Wales. In Scotland, the programme includes the reconstruction of the Glasgow to
Stirling and Glasgow to Carlisle trunk roads.
Work is in progress on three of the five major routes, the motor road from
London to Birmingham which is Britain’s first full-length motorway, the Ross
Spur motorway which will form part of the link between the South Wales ports
and the industrial Midlands, and the Great North Road which is being modernised;
a start has also been made on the Maidstone by-pass on the London to Folkestone
trunk road. Two other shorter roads are also being built to motorway standards,
the Lancaster and the Preston by-passes; the latter was due to be completed before
the end of 1958. The £11 million Dartford-Purfleet road tunnel, under the river
Thames was begun in 1957 and will be ready for traffic by 1962.
A new road tunnel under the river Tyne, between Newcastle and the sea is to
be constructed at a cost of £13 million. In Scotland, the building of a new road
bridge across the Firth of Forth began in 1958, and a road tunnel under the river
Clyde, begun in 1957, is due to be completed by 1962 at a cost of £6-4 million.
ROAD TRANSPORT
In 1957, there were about 7^ million motor vehicles licensed to use Great Britain’s
roads. Of these, over 4 million were motor cars, nearly million were motor
cycles, 1 ^ million were goods vehicles and 99,000 were public road passenger
vehicles (i.e. buses, trams and taxicabs). The transport by road of both passengers
and goods has become of great importance in the national transport system and
has been the subject of much detailed legislation during the past thirty years.
The first world war greatly stimulated the development of motor vehicles.
Public road transport began to make itself felt as a serious competitor of the rail¬
ways and there was keen competition within the road transport industry itself.
The first step towards Government regulation of public road transport was the
passing of the London Traffic Act of 1924, which gave the Minister of Transport
power to control the number of buses and their journeys in London; this was
followed by the setting up of the London Passenger Transport Board in 1933 (see
p. 357). In 1928, a Royal Commission was appointed to examine as a whole