totallymotor.co.uk Logo

News Story

Authorities not planning for increased travel demand

Monday, 14 Jul 2008 00:01
With an increased demand for travel opportunities, specifically in cars, authorities are failing to plan for how they will cope in the future
Although owning a car apparently improves a person's quality of life by approximately one-third, authorities are not doing enough to plan for increased travel demand.

This is according to the Royal Automobile Club Foundation's new report, Travel Demand and its Causes, published today.

The organisation is calling for more car-inclusive planning to acknowledge the fact that sixty per cent of people in England live in car-orientated suburban or rural areas.

Using figures based on past traffic growth and future projections, the RAC Foundation believes these areas will experience strong population and traffic growth up until 2021, resulting in a 25 per cent increase in suburban traffic.

At the time of writing, three out of every four families has a car, while people spend over £50 per week on private transport - nine times as much as they spend on public transport.

Owning a car for the first time increases a household's opportunities to engage in social and economic activities by one third.

In houses where there is no car, on average 15 trips per week are made. This increases to 20 trips per week when one car is available and 22 trips when there are multiple cars available to a household.

More non-drivers get lifts from family friends or relatives than take the bus, showing that the car is an important source of mobility even for non-drivers.

The report finds that, over the past 50 years, there has been a trebling of personal travel as a result of the following factors:-

  • There are 18 per cent more people
  • 60% more families
  • Six times as many cars
  • More smaller households leading to an increase in trips
  • More economically active Britons (an increase of over 25 per cent)
  • An increase in real disposable income
  • An increase on the amount spent on transport - people spend 3.5 times as much on transport as they did in mid 1950s.


When it comes to the relatively distant future, the Foundation forecasts that, by 2031, the population will have increased by 17 per cent from 58.85 million in 2006 to 69.1 million.

The number of households will have increased to 28 million by 2021 and 30 million by 2030, up from 25.2 million in 2006. 'Real' incomes will have grown two and a half percent annually.

Sheila Rainger, head of campaigns for the RAC Foundation, said "The private car has fundamentally changed the way in which people live, making broader education and social activities, and better employment opportunities, available to the many not the few.

"The genie of travel demand cannot be put back into the bottle. The quality of life benefits of increased travel must not be overlooked when it comes to forecasting demand and planning our future road and transport network."

Related Stories 

Motor Vote 

  • Car of the Year 2008

    The retro charm of the all new Fiat 500 conquered the hearts of the judges and won the coveted European Car of the Year Award 2008. But do you agree with the judges? Full Story

Motor View