Petrol is too cheap + Using the Hard Shoulder

[Bandidoz]

....because there's more and more cars on the roads!!

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1096



Quite an interesting idea has evolved on the use of hard shoulders to cope with greater traffic capacity on motorways - although it's probably to save money, I wonder if any "Peak Oil" thought has gone into avoiding widening the motorways....

http://www.highways.gov.uk/knowledge/1361.aspx

[WolfattheDoor]

Another example of the government taking the easiest way out.

The real way to solve congestion would be to get more people onto public transport by subsidy and increased driving costs, and to reduce the amount of commuting we do. That would be unpopular, difficult and expensive.

Building more roads, which is what using the hard shoulder is effectively doing, reduces congestion in the short term but increases it in the long term.

Like nuclear power instead of renewables/energy reduction, it is taking the easy way out of solving the real problems.

[isenhand]

Like nuclear power instead of renewables/energy reduction, it is taking the easy way out of solving the real problems.

Or not fixing the problem at all, just patching up the facade

[snow hope]

Crikey, we will need some incredible levels of energy reduction and renewable energy production to solve the problems of our electricity requirements! I think we will need all hands to deck including as much nuclear as we can get. That's being realistic in my opinion.

[isenhand]

Crikey, we will need some incredible levels of energy reduction and renewable energy production to solve the problems of our electricity requirements! I think we will need all hands to deck including as much nuclear as we can get. That's being realistic in my opinion.

We do have quite a lot of waste in our current system so we do have plenty of possibilities to reduce our consumption and still maintain a high standard of living but I don?t believe we can do that with our current socioeconomic system.

[kenneal - lagger]

The problem with nuclear, Snow Hope, is that when we come to decommission the new nuclear power stations in 40 or 50 years time, we may not have enough energy to do it. Then we'll be left with umpteen nukes festering around the country for 100,000 years or so.