Midlands Friends of the Earth West Midlands Transport Group

This briefing sets out why Friends of the Earth believes construction of the Birmingham Northern Relief Road (BNRR) should not go ahead.

The BNRR is a proposed 27 mile, dual three lane, tolled motorway which would run from the M6 South of the West Midlands conurbation to the M6 North of the conurbation. The proposals are being promoted by the Highway Agency and Midland Expressway Limited, (a private consortium of Kveaner and Autostrada,) who want to build and operate the toll road for a 53 year concession. It is the largest new road proposal in the current roads programme.

Despite previous commitments not to go ahead with the proposals, the road was given permission in July 1997 by the Secretary of State, John Prescott. Line orders are expected in January 1998 and the company say they will begin construction in early 1999, although this timetable may slip.

Friends of the Earth believe Midland Expressway should pull out and the Government should withdraw the proposals. They should then institute demand management techniques throughout the Midlands to reduce traffic, improving the environment and the economy.

Friends of the Earth believe the BNRR should not go ahead because:

1. BNRR would destroy 27 miles of Green Belt and damage two nationally important SSSIs, one severely.
2. BNRR is likely to generate extra traffic, because local land use changes resulting from BNRR would lead to traffic generation and because the road would encourage extra journeys on the local network. This would undermine Green Belt policy and increase overall travel.
3. BNRR would not generate new business, regionally or nationally, but would lead to the relocation of businesses away from the inner city and into the Green Belt.
4. BNRR would fail to reduce congestion on roads in the West Midlands overall and specifically on the M6.
5. BNRR would increase traffic on the M6 north and south of the conurbation adding delays to long distance through traffic. This would lead to further publicly financed road widening which would encourage further traffic growth.
6. No Cost Benefit Analysis (COBA) of the Private BNRR has ever been carried out, although this would be the method normally used to quantify the economic benefit of a new road. Work by expert consultants suggests that such an exercise would show the road was not in the public interest.

1. BNRR would destroy 27 miles of Green Belt and damage two nationally important SSSIs, one severely.

   The Birmingham Northern Relief Road passes through the Green Belt to the North and West of the West Midlands. Even without knock on development it would have a severe effect on the countryside around the conurbation. It passes through two Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs). Blythe Valley and Chasewater Heath, in the later case causing what the Highway Agency admit is 'severe' damage.

   The damage is not only comparable with roads such as the Newbury and Salisbury Bypass, it is extended over a much longer route.

2. BNRR is likely to generate extra traffic, because local land use changes resulting from BNRR would lead to traffic generation and because the road would encourage extra journeys on the local network. This would undermine Green Belt policy and increase overall travel.

   In the case of the Birmingham Northern Relief Road the generation of traffic on the M6 and other roads in the conurbation would be minimal because there is little surplus capacity released by the new road. The effect would simply be to 'top-up' the M6 to the limits it would have reached anyway. However, the BNRR would be expected to generate significant traffic on the A5-A38 route and on other locally roads where there would be huge potential for increased travel between peripheral suburban areas, a result of new road building already identified on the M25 orbital round London.

   MEL claimed at the Public Inquiry that this would not happen because BNRR is tolled. However this is only true for BNRR itself, not for the surrounding roads.

   The Standing Advisory Committee on Trunk Road Assessment (SACTRA) identified three causes of traffic generation, which were accepted by the Department of Transport. They were:

   • where the network is operating or expected to operate close to capacity;
   • where travellers responsiveness to changes in travel timed or cost is high, as may occur where trips are suppressed by congestion and then released when the network is improved;
   • where the implementation of a scheme causes large changes in travel costs.

   All three factors could be applied to BNRR, especially since SACTRA also make clear in their report that road on the urban perimeter such as BNRR are high contenders for traffic generation.

   Furthermore, Green belt development, whether for business, housing or leisure, tends to generate extra traffic. BNRR would act as a catalyst to new green field development. Sites have already been identified close to the BNRR and more can be expected. One would expect development along the road to play a key role in increasing traffic levels on BNRR and neighbouring roads as it has done on the M42 and other orbital motorways. Clearly this would be exacerbated by the widening of the M42 and a Western Orbital if they were bought forward, but it is also clear that the ability to commute long distances to orbital sites exists even without those schemes, using the current M42, M6 and M40. A number of proposals, already being persued in the Green Belt, depend on BNRR.

   The recent decision to go ahead with a large new industrial site in the Green Belt at Peddimore close to BNRR despite a Public Inquiry recommendation that the application was refused indicates the seriousness of these fears.

   BNRR is likely to generate extra traffic as new development leads to more dispersed lifestyles in the region. This extra traffic would add to congestion and increase business costs. It would be amazing for a Government to give the go ahead for the construction of the BNRR when the evidence of new traffic generation from the road is so strong.

3. BNRR would not generate new business, regionally or nationally, but would lead to the relocation of businesses away from the inner city and into the Green Belt.

   It is commonly believed that new transport infrastructure leads to new investment in a region. Most of the academic research done into the question suggests that the main impact of new road infrastructure (beyond the most basic provision) is to relocate existing and prospective businesses within the local region. In the case of large new infrastructure provision it can also encourage centralisation of distribution away from peripheral areas to stronger central locations.

   This position was established as early as 1977 by the Leitch Committee on Trunk Road Assessment reporting to the Government. Similar conclusions were formed in the US when Payne-Maxie reported to the US Transportation Department a year or so later. A similar conclusion was also admitted by the Department of Transport in respect to the M62 and in the report of the European Conference of Ministers for Transport in 1991.

   The Department of Transport acknowledges that road construction is only a necessary, not a sufficient cause for new investment, a position they held, for example, at the Kidderminster Blakedown Hagley Bypass Public Inquiry.

   The overall attractiveness of a region largely depends on the availability of good land, regional grants and skilled labour. The West Midlands has been highly successful at attracting inward investment in the last decade despite claims that it has poor road infrastructure. Construction of BNRR would lead to a relative advantage in inward investment terms to peripheral Green Belt sites, such as those already identified and pursued at places like Bassett's Pole, Sandhills and, as mentioned above, Peddimore. These sites would take investment away from other areas of the conurbation, especially since the M6 would remain heavily congested. Much of the urban West Midlands would actually become more 'remote' as the burden of advantage went to green field sites.

   Just as the recently completed Black Country roads fulfilled their purpose of providing access to inaccessible sites within the conurbation, so BNRR would open up the countryside to development at the expense of the inner city.

   BNRR redistributes economic activity into the Green Belt but it does not provide an impetus for new investment in the West Midlands.

4. BNRR would fail to reduce congestion on roads in the West Midlands and specifically the M6.

   By far the largest claimed benefit for new transport infrastructure comes from time savings to business and freight. Although transport only accounts for about 5% of the average company's costs many businessmen emphasise the increased reliability they expect as a result of new infrastructure

   However as the road network becomes more complex, car dependency tends to rises and congestion becomes endemic. As a result time savings from new infrastructure diminish rapidly. The West Midlands conurbation is so congested that time savings from new roads are minimal and are often eaten up by longer delays in other parts of the system. Furthermore, new infrastructure encourages longer journeys and thus leads to new traffic generation undermining the road's original purpose of reducing congestion.

   Figures produced at the Inquiry by the promoters of the tolled BNRR show that congestion on the M6 is unchanged as a result of the BNRR, reaching 160,000 vehicles a day whatever is done. This is not surprising since congestion is largely caused by local traffic accessing the conurbation. 70% of the traffic (and 80% in the peaks) is locally generated or coming into and out of the conurbation. A large amount of traffic in the West Midlands would like to use the M6 but is put off by congestion. Transferring traffic to the BNRR simply leads to traffic transferring from other roads onto the M6 followed by the generation of 'top-up' amounts of new traffic. An untolled BNRR would lead to greater initial transfer from the M6 but would also generate more traffic overall.

   Either way the M6 would remain congested at the peaks and would not, as a result of BNRR, provide an improved service.

5. BNRR would increase traffic on the M6 north and south of the conurbation adding delays to long distance through traffic. This would lead to further publicly financed road widening which would encourage further traffic growth.

   For long distance traffic BNRR does not provide a preferable alternative to the M6.

   At the Public Inquiry into BNRR the Highways Agency admitted that the construction of an untolled BNRR would lead to a congested M6 and a congested BNRR because a large amount of local traffic would use the motorway to 'junction hop', including new 'generated' traffic. On the other hand tolling the BNRR deters a large amount of potential traffic from using it. MEL's own market research suggests that less than 50% of the potential car users and only 30% of HGVs would use a tolled BNRR.

   The tolling situation is further complicated because the concession allows Midland Expressway Limited to charge tolls on a purely commercial basis without regulation. They say it will cost œ2 for cars to use the road and œ4 for lorries. They may choose to take less traffic and charge higher tolls. Other bidders for the road had considerably higher toll regimes. Indeed, the Inquiry Inspector accepted that MEL might deliberately raise the toll for Heavy Goods Vehicles to exclude them from the motorway and concentrate on the more lucrative car market, but the Secretary of State rejected any regulation. This means the impact of BNRR on traffic could be even worse.

   Furthermore, if a tolled BNRR provides some time savings, (and these would only exist when the M6 is heavily congested,) these would be undermined by a growth in traffic on other roads. The Highway Agency says the construction of the BNRR would add an extra 40% to the traffic using the M6 in Staffordshire.

   The BNRR would not provide improved access to the West Midlands and would make congestion on some roads worse, including those which carry long distance traffic.

   It could be argued that, since the M6 north of the conurbation is due for widening, this problem can be alleviated. The widening of the M6 in Staffordshire has recently been costed by the Highway Agency at œ415 million. Even if that money were available from the Public Purse, (and discounting the unpaid for benefit to the private toll company,) it would probably only provide enough additional space to cope with new traffic coming off BNRR. That could mean œ415 million being spent by the Government with no overall benefit. It could also have the knock on effect of fuelling traffic generation in Staffordshire.

   The Government is currently reviewing the overall roads programme. The corridor from London to Manchester includes some of the largest new proposals for road widening at a total estimated cost of œ1.7 billion. Friends of the Earth believe this is a self defeating project which should be scrapped at the earliest date. Generating new traffic in Manchester, Birmingham and on the M25, which is already full, is environmental and economic madness. We view BNRR as a key component of this proposal.

6. No Cost Benefit Analysis (COBA) of the Private BNRR has ever been carried out, although this would be the method normally used to quantify the economic benefit of a new road. Work by expert consultants suggests that such an exercise would show the road was not in the public interest.

   The Highway Agency has not completed any Cost Benefit Analysis of the tolled BNRR proposals. It argues that using the road constitutes a private transaction and that, since tax money is not directly involved, a COBA isn't needed. Such a view means that we have no objective assessment of BNRRs economic benefits and cannot say whether it is in the public interest or not.

   A Cost Benefit Analysis was undertaken for World Wide Fund for Nature by Keith Buchan of MTRU, (an advisor to the British Government on Traffic Predictions.) Using standard techniques he concluded that the costs of the road were greater than the benefits (i.e. it had a negative COBA) The difference gets progressively worse year on year, reaching -œ30 million by 2011. Much of the costs he identified were associated with new delays to drivers in the system because of BNRR. His COBA calculation did not include any external environmental costs such as loss of productive farm land or added pollution damage.

   BNRR fails to meet the most basic criteria of good economic value for money, and the Highway Agency has done nothing to prove a rigorous COBA economic case for building the road. On this basis alone we believe it should be rejected.

Conclusions

This paper has set out why we believe the BNRR should not go ahead, why it would not improve the economy, ease traffic problems or benefit the environment. We believe those who argue otherwise rely on outdated and simplistic arguments, underestimating the potential for new traffic generation in the region and overestimating the impacts of roads on inward investment.

In our view the only way to reduce congestion in the West Midlands is to reduce overall traffic levels in line with emerging Government Policy, as expressed in the Road Traffic Reduction Act which was promoted by Friends of the Earth nationally. This would need three major policy initiatives in the region: increased investment in Public Transport, walking and cycling, fiscal measures to control car use and strong land use policies aimed at reducing the need to travel.

Link to Kveaner General Information Web Page

Friends of the Earth West Midlands Transport Campaign is a network of local Friends of the Earth Groups set up specifically to address Regional Transport Issues.

• We have also actively campaigned against the Western Orbital Motorway, the Kidderminster Hagley Bypass and the widening of motorways in the region.
• We have supported objectors at Public Inquiries such as the Merry Hill Expansion Inquiry and the Peddimore Major Investment Site Inquiry where we believed the development would increase traffic and undermine environmental transport objectives.
• We have also taken part in regional discussions on transport and worked with other organisations to promote alternative transport strategies regionally, including the strengthening of town centres, control of car parking and the reopening of local railway services.
• We were a founder member of the Alliance Against the Birmingham Northern Relief Road, which is supported by almost all the local resident groups along the route and by environmental groups such as World Wide Fund for Nature, Transport 2000 and Alarm UK.

There is cross party opposition from MPs to BNRR along the line of the road, as well as opposition from Councils such as Walsall and Warwickshire.

There were 10,000 registered objectors to the road at the Public Inquiry stage and approximately 40 supporters.