May 10th, 2010
Weymouth Relief Road: no relief at all
We all know that the Weymouth Relief Road which is currently tearing through the Dorset heaths, coastal areas of outstanding natural beauty, sites of special scientific interest and irreplaceable ancient woodland once owned by the Woodland Trust, is no relief at all and is in truth a terrible idea.
So is there any hope that when we finally get a new government in place, they will learn from this nasty mistake and remember party promises to slash road budgets?
The message coming from national campaigns such as Campaign for Better Transport is loud and clear: “ignore the pet projects and outdated road schemes, and spend what little money we have fixing the roads we’ve already got.”
Whilst the maintenance Verses expansion argument is a compelling one, it appears it doesn’t win elections. Especially when faced with the prospect of an effective lobbying backlash from motoring lobby groups like the AA and the freight industry together with business interests such as the CBI and Regional Development Authorities, it’s not surprising that most politicians turn and run for the hills on this issue.
Obviously with the prospect of the 2012 Olympics tipping the scale, Weymouth’s areas of outstanding natural beauty didn’t stand a chance, but given the fractious economic climate any new government will inherit, then surely it makes sense to spend money on jobs and manpower to fix existing roads rather than machines and faceless contractors to build new ones people don’t want?