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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/03/stop-holiday-addicted-travel-government-journeys
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| Do your fellow Brits a favour. Stop going on holiday | Do your fellow Brits a favour. Stop going on holiday |
| (6 months later) | |
| Thu 3 Aug 2017 07.00 BST | |
| Last modified on Mon 27 Nov 2017 19.04 GMT | |
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| I’m in a hurry. You’re in my way. They are bloody tourists. My journey is vital, yours discretionary and theirs absurdly unnecessary. Transport policy has always been the orchestration of selfishness. This coming week, travel to Europe’s most popular air destinations will apparently be hell. “Security” will mean hours of queues at immigration, though the delays seem curiously aimed at non-Schengen nationals, notably the British, in a foretaste of hard Brexit to come. | I’m in a hurry. You’re in my way. They are bloody tourists. My journey is vital, yours discretionary and theirs absurdly unnecessary. Transport policy has always been the orchestration of selfishness. This coming week, travel to Europe’s most popular air destinations will apparently be hell. “Security” will mean hours of queues at immigration, though the delays seem curiously aimed at non-Schengen nationals, notably the British, in a foretaste of hard Brexit to come. |
| Meanwhile, staycationers must face the torment of holiday roadworks on a motorway network where average speeds are falling and traffic is up 18% on 20 years ago, with minimal rise in capacity. Average speed on the M25 is now down to 25mph and on the M4 to 30mph. That is no motorway. | Meanwhile, staycationers must face the torment of holiday roadworks on a motorway network where average speeds are falling and traffic is up 18% on 20 years ago, with minimal rise in capacity. Average speed on the M25 is now down to 25mph and on the M4 to 30mph. That is no motorway. |
| For those who can afford a train, overcrowding was last week revealed as unprecedented, with some trains in 2016 running in and out of London Bridge and other London terminals at more than 200% of capacity. | For those who can afford a train, overcrowding was last week revealed as unprecedented, with some trains in 2016 running in and out of London Bridge and other London terminals at more than 200% of capacity. |
| Transport policy is becoming like the cornucopia of absurdity that is energy policy | Transport policy is becoming like the cornucopia of absurdity that is energy policy |
| None of us wants to admit we are the problem. Since the 19th century, mobility has been a human right, with the state obliged to “maintain the highway”. Then trains were for all, as were planes when they symbolised postwar prosperity by giving even poorer people the freedom to fly on holiday. Students were subsidised to study away from home. Garden cities encouraged long journeys to work. Commuting boomed, and no one thought anything amiss. | None of us wants to admit we are the problem. Since the 19th century, mobility has been a human right, with the state obliged to “maintain the highway”. Then trains were for all, as were planes when they symbolised postwar prosperity by giving even poorer people the freedom to fly on holiday. Students were subsidised to study away from home. Garden cities encouraged long journeys to work. Commuting boomed, and no one thought anything amiss. |
| Today my impression is that most journeys point-to-point are getting longer, not shorter. The reason is simply that more people are travelling more often. If we keep doing this, it will get worse. There is no point in blaming others. We should look at our own diaries. | Today my impression is that most journeys point-to-point are getting longer, not shorter. The reason is simply that more people are travelling more often. If we keep doing this, it will get worse. There is no point in blaming others. We should look at our own diaries. |
| Why do people feel this restless urge to “get away” all the time? Why do they regard a holiday at home as a sign of poverty or failure? Why do they endure the battle scars of air travel, and occupy 20% of a weekend of leisure getting away and back? The answer is because they want to. They are hypermobile, like the sharks that must keep moving to stay afloat. Slow is sad. Stop is dead. | Why do people feel this restless urge to “get away” all the time? Why do they regard a holiday at home as a sign of poverty or failure? Why do they endure the battle scars of air travel, and occupy 20% of a weekend of leisure getting away and back? The answer is because they want to. They are hypermobile, like the sharks that must keep moving to stay afloat. Slow is sad. Stop is dead. |
| There is no way any government can “predict and provide” the infrastructure needed for ever greater mobility. The city specifically designed for it, Los Angeles, now has one of the world’s slowest journeys to work after Mexico City. In Britain, intercity rail travel will soon be like planes, accessible only with advance booking. As airport slots get ever more crammed, and fatuous security becomes a ruling obsession, plane travel will mimic the Victorian immigrant steerage hulks, with hordes of travellers sitting caged for hours in silent misery. | There is no way any government can “predict and provide” the infrastructure needed for ever greater mobility. The city specifically designed for it, Los Angeles, now has one of the world’s slowest journeys to work after Mexico City. In Britain, intercity rail travel will soon be like planes, accessible only with advance booking. As airport slots get ever more crammed, and fatuous security becomes a ruling obsession, plane travel will mimic the Victorian immigrant steerage hulks, with hordes of travellers sitting caged for hours in silent misery. |
| One of the many ironies of the much-vaunted digital revolution is that it has not enabled everyone to work and play at home, happily linked to the outside world by electronics. The internet has done the opposite. It has facilitated the experience economy. People no more want a “virtual” holiday than a businessman wants a virtual perk flight, or an academic a virtual foreign conference. Travel is status, hypermobile is cool. | One of the many ironies of the much-vaunted digital revolution is that it has not enabled everyone to work and play at home, happily linked to the outside world by electronics. The internet has done the opposite. It has facilitated the experience economy. People no more want a “virtual” holiday than a businessman wants a virtual perk flight, or an academic a virtual foreign conference. Travel is status, hypermobile is cool. |
| Modern government’s desperate answer is “rationing by congestion”, since rationing by price is politically unpopular. But making mobility a hell for travellers, worthy and unworthy, cannot be sustainable in the long run. Travel outside London, for rich and poor, is overwhelmingly by road. Congestion hits buses as well as cars. Business cites Britain’s dreadful roads as one of the chief obstacles to productivity. | Modern government’s desperate answer is “rationing by congestion”, since rationing by price is politically unpopular. But making mobility a hell for travellers, worthy and unworthy, cannot be sustainable in the long run. Travel outside London, for rich and poor, is overwhelmingly by road. Congestion hits buses as well as cars. Business cites Britain’s dreadful roads as one of the chief obstacles to productivity. |
| British transport policy is making congestion worse. It is becoming like the cornucopia of absurdity that is energy policy. The government encourages mobility by imposing 20% VAT on holidays at home, but not on holidays abroad. This is why you rarely see domestic vacations promoted by British travel agents. The planning of airport capacity – overwhelmingly for leisure travel – has no rationale. It is London-centred, dictated by Heathrow lobbyists seeking to boost demand; it increases west London congestion and ignores installed capacity at Stansted. | British transport policy is making congestion worse. It is becoming like the cornucopia of absurdity that is energy policy. The government encourages mobility by imposing 20% VAT on holidays at home, but not on holidays abroad. This is why you rarely see domestic vacations promoted by British travel agents. The planning of airport capacity – overwhelmingly for leisure travel – has no rationale. It is London-centred, dictated by Heathrow lobbyists seeking to boost demand; it increases west London congestion and ignores installed capacity at Stansted. |
| The concentration of holidays in August, when July is just as sunny (if not more so), is a medieval hangover from the need to bring in the harvest. It makes no sense, not least when many universities pack up at the end of May. Bank holidays are likewise outdated. They should be converted into flexible days off. | The concentration of holidays in August, when July is just as sunny (if not more so), is a medieval hangover from the need to bring in the harvest. It makes no sense, not least when many universities pack up at the end of May. Bank holidays are likewise outdated. They should be converted into flexible days off. |
| On the railways, last month’s abandonment of line electrification in Wales, the Midlands and Yorkshire beggared belief. It leaves Britain in Europe’s transport dark ages. It is the crude price the Treasury has exacted from the transport secretary, Chris Grayling, for his gutless refusal to do the sensible thing and put the HS2 vanity project on indefinite hold. Billions of pounds are to be denied to rail services in the north merely to ease the least-crowded commuter line into London – to be followed by a new London Crossrail 2. It is an epic infrastructure blunder. | On the railways, last month’s abandonment of line electrification in Wales, the Midlands and Yorkshire beggared belief. It leaves Britain in Europe’s transport dark ages. It is the crude price the Treasury has exacted from the transport secretary, Chris Grayling, for his gutless refusal to do the sensible thing and put the HS2 vanity project on indefinite hold. Billions of pounds are to be denied to rail services in the north merely to ease the least-crowded commuter line into London – to be followed by a new London Crossrail 2. It is an epic infrastructure blunder. |
| Every decision of government should now be audited for minimising its increased demand for mobility. On both road and rail, it should be biased towards regional rebalancing. Students should have incentives to study in their home cities. Taxation should discourage employment and development in the south-east in favour of the north. Car-based, green-field housing estates should be banned in favour of urban densification. | Every decision of government should now be audited for minimising its increased demand for mobility. On both road and rail, it should be biased towards regional rebalancing. Students should have incentives to study in their home cities. Taxation should discourage employment and development in the south-east in favour of the north. Car-based, green-field housing estates should be banned in favour of urban densification. |
| Such considerations as pressure on infrastructure and journeys to work are unknown to Whitehall’s intellectually bankrupt department for communities and local government. Its Orwellian title should be renamed “department against communities and local government”. | Such considerations as pressure on infrastructure and journeys to work are unknown to Whitehall’s intellectually bankrupt department for communities and local government. Its Orwellian title should be renamed “department against communities and local government”. |
| Hypermobility is a national addiction. It is a drug that is enhanced rather than combated by government policy. If we can have green taxes to promote efficient energy, we should have taxes to promote efficient mobility. The government may allow congestion to ration choice. It may make the pursuit of pleasure a little more painful with each passing year – unless you are a premium ticket-holder on HS2. If that is Grayling’s policy, he should at least admit it. But surely government should not be spending public money making matters worse. | Hypermobility is a national addiction. It is a drug that is enhanced rather than combated by government policy. If we can have green taxes to promote efficient energy, we should have taxes to promote efficient mobility. The government may allow congestion to ration choice. It may make the pursuit of pleasure a little more painful with each passing year – unless you are a premium ticket-holder on HS2. If that is Grayling’s policy, he should at least admit it. But surely government should not be spending public money making matters worse. |
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