The stupidest target in British transport

Two books to recommend to my fellow transportation nerds: Travel Fast or Smart? A Manifesto for an Intelligent Transport Policy by David Metz, formerly chief boffin at the Department for Transport; and Are Trams Socialist? Why Britain Has No Transport Policy by Christian Wolmar. The first is excellent throughout, the second is excellent right up to the final pages when, as many British transport commentators are liable to do, Wolmar rhapsodises about European approaches to city planning with their ‘bicycle superhighways’ and, yes, those bloody trams. You know the kind of thing: ‘In the Norwegian port of Slartibartfast, all cars are banned from the city centre before midnight, and the high street has been converted into an organic kale farm.’

That aside, both books make excellent and related points. Metz is a proponent of the idea of ‘peak car’. He believes, plausibly I think, that the appetite for motoring has natural limits, and that other factors — growing urbanisation; online shopping; the proliferation of supermarkets; home-working — mean that even if car ownership grows, car use might not.