Tag: dft

• Throwing random numbers at the problem

  *UPDATE: I have now confirmed that the government has not green lit 28 local road schemes*

  The Department for Transport announcement about a “green light for over 50 road and rail upgrades” has a lot of random numbers and very little detail but cannot disguise the fact that Labour is throwing a lot of money at road schemes in a climate emergency, with very little for rail.

  One number that isn’t in the press release is the £1.5bn cost of the A66 Northern Trans-Pennine, which I wrote about yesterday, and which dwarfs the “£27 million to reinstate passenger rail services between Portishead and Bristol city centre”.

  Neither is the benefit cost ratio of 0.9 for the A66 scheme, representing poor value for money.

  And it is unclear how much funding the government is giving the Midlands Rail Hub, other than that it is “significant”.

  

  Among some obviously made-up numbers about road and rail schemes supporting tens of thousands of new jobs and new homes, there seems to be quite a sleight of hand over the number of road schemes that have actually been given the green light.

  (more…)

  2025.07.08

• Shropshire bows to the inevitable over unfunded £215m road scheme

  Shropshire Council has shelved the £215m Shrewsbury North West Relief Road (NWRR) after the Department for Transport (DfT) made clear that it will not put up any money beyond the £54m originally pledged.

  The council, which is now run by the Liberal Democrats, said leader Heather Kidd and deputy leader Alex Wagner met DfT officers earlier this week to “discuss the scheme, seek clarity about funding and explore options with regards to its future”:

  During the meeting officers from the DfT confirmed that they would not award any more money than had been originally allocated to the project. Furthermore, the Local Transport Fund of £136.4m, originally mooted by the previous administration to fund the scheme, has been replaced with a Local Transport Grant totalling only £48m.

  However, they also confirmed that the council would need to cancel work on the road before a formal discussion could proceed with Roads Minister Lilian Greenwood MP, the Department for Transport and other parts of central government about the £39m it has already spent on the scheme.

  The council said it had “paused all work” on the scheme but Cllr Kidd said the council had no choice but to cancel it, faced with a funding gap of over £176m:

  “Through our conversations with the Department for Transport, it was made very clear that no more funding would be allocated to the scheme. This makes it simply unaffordable.

  “As you can imagine, there are many implications for cancelling the road however we really have no choice.”

  (more…)

  2025.06.26