Create Streets Managing Director David Milner has been announced as one if the Transport Secretary’s Capital Review Panellists, assessing major transport schemes.
I’m delighted to serve on the Transport Secretary’s Capital Review Panel.
Like much of life, transport is all about networks. Yet in too many places and for too long, trains, buses, bikes, trams and cars have stayed in their own lanes providing a skeleton of a service. An integrated transport strategy, that puts people at its heart, can reap the rewards of reliable, connected journeys to get the blood pumping through the veins of our cities.
Better transport is desperately needed to drive growth and prosperity. Too many British cities are unproductive compared to European counterparts, shackled by lack of transport choice and chained down by too few homes.
Housing and transport are two sides of the same coin. You cannot solve one problem without the other. With modern Britain missing millions of homes, continuing to build sprawling housing estates will take too long and create yet more of the congested roads we need to fix. Integrated, reliable and efficient transport networks that tie trams, bikes and buses together can help us deliver more homes on less land and build homes, shops and services at gentle densities. It is time for us as a society to move from being housebuilders to becoming town builders.
Trams and metros, the backbone of local transport, are ridiculously efficient at moving people. They create enormous economic agglomeration boosts and allow us to tread more lightly on the planet by helping people live and work closer together. A 3.5m wide city road lane used for a tram line can shift eleven times more people per hour than the same lane used by private vehicles. This is good for towns and cities and the people who live in them.
I look forward to playing my part in addressing Britain’s transport challenges and creating a future where more people have more opportunities to live and work happily, well and sustainably.”
Official announcement here