Survey: UK Public Backs High-speed Rail as Alternative to Domestic Flights
08 June 2009
Almost two thirds of people in the UK think high-speed rail could fully replace domestic flights in the UK, according to a survey recently released by the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE).
The research, conducted for ICE by polling company ComRes, polled more than 1,000 people and found that 63% of respondents thought an expanded high-speed rail in the UK could end the need for short haul flights within UK.
These results show evidence of public support for a high-speed rail network as an alternative to domestic air travel. Our airport runways are already congested, and air travel is one of the biggest contributors of carbon emissions in the UK.
Providing faster, affordable rail services between major cities could reduce demand for short haul air travel, and possibly put an end to it completely. Let’s not forget that Paris to Brussels was once a short haul flight route but is now serviced exclusively by high-speed rail.
—Tom Foulkes, ICE’s director general
The study also found that the majority of respondents were confident that high-speed rail will boost economic growth (71%), reduce congestion on roads and motorways (73%) and free up space on existing railway lines (73%).
The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) was founded in 1818 to ensure professionalism in civil engineering. It represents 80,000 qualified and student civil engineers in the UK and across the globe.
I sooo want a transrapid system throughout the length and breadth of Britain.
I'd happily pay the extra taxes for it too.
Posted by: clett | 08 June 2009 at 04:33 AM
Good luck on that high speed rail to Belfast :)
FYI, UK has a population density of 242 p/km^2. Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Deleware, Maryland, DC, Pennsylvania, and Ohio have a combined population of about 65,000,000 and a density if 153 p/km^2. Get rid of PA and OH, and you've got 205 p/km^2. Add in Eastern PA (Philly et al) and Northern Virginia (NOVA) and you could easily have 225 p/km^2 -- a region of land about the size of the UK and about the same population.
If the United Kingdom can do it, why couldn't the "Northern Mid Atlantic" United States do it to? It'd basically be Acela on steroids -- faster, and with service to smaller cities, including an NYC run through Albany and an I-90 from Niagra to Boston. You'd need a Springfield to New Haven through Hartford spur, perhaps some spurs in NJ, DE, and MD to get folks off the main corridor.
It's worth noting that among the 50 busiest airports are BOS, BWI, EWR, JFK, LGA, PHL, IAD, and DCA. Include all of PA and OH, and we add CLE, CMH, and PIT. Even if the reduction in demand only served to offset the growth, we could have 8-12 airports which wouldn't need to expand in the foreseeable future.
Now that, my friends, is a public works project worthy of TVA fame, and far far smaller than Eisenhower's Interstate Highway project...
Posted by: stomv | 08 June 2009 at 07:40 AM
At some point, rising fuel prices will make commercial air travel as we know it economically nonviable. HSR seems to me to be an important component of our future transportation system. I hope we start to see some HSR progress in the U.S. soon.
Posted by: DesignImpact | 08 June 2009 at 07:50 AM
People will back high speed rail until they find out that a route is planned through their back yard. The Channel Tunnel Rail Link was opened 10 years after the Channel Tunnel for this reason, the french had their TGV link open before.
The problems...nimbys and lack of funding for mitigating the worst impacts via tunnelling and so on. So don't expect anyhing in the UK soon - for at least 30 years. By that time planes will be flying on biofuels refined from pondscum.
Posted by: Scott | 08 June 2009 at 09:27 AM
Present conditions may not be a very good indicator for the future. The achilles heel of air travel is that it requires energy dense portable fuel, namely, jet fuel, a type of kerosene. Although the military are investigating use of biofuels for aircraft, biofuel production has shown itself to be more problematic than first realized.
Rail, a form of linear transport, has the advantage of being able to be driven from mains electric power. Although electricity production presently is very dependent on fossil fuels, it does not need to be so. Electricity is the easiest form of energy to produce sustainably from non-carbon sources.
Posted by: fred schumacher | 12 June 2009 at 06:23 AM