David Cameron stated that plans for the biggest road building programme for almost half a century will be unveiled in next month's Autumn Statement (December 3), and contain a £15 billion overhaul of 100 of Britain's busiest roads and motorways by the end of the decade as the economy continues to recover.
Commenting on the statement, Malcolm Bingham, FTA’s head of road network management policy, said: ‘FTA is pleased to hear of the planned “roads revolution” as such improvements have to be good news for all UK freight operators. Improved road reliability will help to ensure transport operators can provide an efficient service to their customers and will reduce the unnecessary costs associated with traffic jams.
‘Such roads improvements will also assist the economies of those areas which are badly served by strategic transport infrastructure such as the Trans Pennine routes, the South West, Eastern and North East England. The combination of improved roads, rail and port connections are the lifeblood of this country and the need for improvement is well demonstrated.’
Speaking at the Confederation of British Industry’s (CBI) annual conference in London, Cameron said that the Government will embark on the ‘biggest, boldest and most far-reaching road improvement programme’ for 40 years.
‘FTA believes that the UK’s roads networks have suffered from underfunding from successive governments. This is supported by our own research in which FTA members reported a deterioration in the reliability of the road network compared with 12 months ago,’ Bingham added.
‘With an almost 30% decrease in reliability of the motorway network and over 40 per cent decrease in local authority roads performance, urgent investment is needed to improve journey reliability on major routes.’
FTA has said that it waits ‘with interest’ to see the detailed plans of the Autumn Statement on 3 December to discover the exact type of infrastructure that is outlined within the proposed plans within it.