Transport Infrastructure — House of Commons, 2020-02-11
Topic: Transportation
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): With your permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement on the transport revolution that we intend to bring about There are all sorts of reasons why the city in which we now sit is the most productive region in the whole of Europe. We have the time zone, the language and the agglomeration of talents. Above all, we have a mass transit system that every day conveys millions of people efficiently and affordably, with tubes and trains and 8,600 buses, into the central activities zone in the morning and out in the evening, like the respiration of some vast undersea coelenterate. As the public transport network has expanded in the last 150 years, it has brought hope and opportunity and job prospects to people growing up in every part of the city and beyond. It is the ambition of this Government to employ that same utensil—fantastic transport infrastructure—to unite and level up across the whole country Of course there is far more to do in London—frankly, the present Mayor needs to be shaken out of his complacency—but there is even more to do across the nation as a whole. Whether they are stuck in a jam on the A303 or on the outskirts of Lincoln, whether they are trying to get from Warrington to Manchester or toiling across the Pennines by rail, people know that this country is being held back by our inadequate infrastructure. So in the next few weeks this Government will be setting out more details of the transport revolution, because we all know the potential of transport to change people’s life and the life of their town or city. We know that efficient transport can clean the air and cut pollution and get cars off the road. We can simultaneously reach our ambition of net zero by 2050 and shorten people’s commute, giving them more time with their family, increase productivity and bring business and investment to left behind communities That is why we are embarking now on a massive programme of investment in local transport, starting with a record-breaking £5 billion of new investment in buses and bicycles. That investment will mean bus passengers across the country seeing a dramatic improvement in their daily journeys, with more than 4,000 brand-new buses—zero-carbon, British-built buses—on the roads of places such as Ashfield, Barnstaple, Southampton, Manchester and many more towns and cities besides. There will be more services, including in the evenings and weekends, as well as simpler, cheaper and more convenient ticketing and properly designed priority schemes to speed passengers past the traffic jams. It is an investment that will also mean cyclists enjoying hundreds of miles of brand-new separated lanes, with "mini-Hollands" blooming like so many tulips in towns and cities right across the country That £5 billion is just the start. My very good friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer will be making a full announcement in next month’s Budget, and I have no desire to steal his thunder, but I can signal today that we are taking forward transformative improvements from Cornwall to the A1 north of Newcastle, from south Salisbury to south Ribble, from Cheadle to Chiverton, with dual carriageways, roundabouts, bypasses and underpasses—and those are just the roads. We have already set out plans to explore new investments in the rail network across the north, developing proposals to reopen the Fleetwood line in Lancashire and the Ashington to Blyth rail line in the north-east, improving track and platform capacity at Middlesbrough station—