Better Transport

The Government is planning to create four so-called eco-towns in this country.  But the sustainability of any eco-town is all down to the detail on transport provision:

• Northwest Bicester in Oxfordshire: Creating an eco-quarter will be challenging and will need good links to the existing rail station
• Rackheath, Norfolk: Potentially  suitable as an eco-town/eco-quarter, served by rail (and with potential for railfreight), but is being linked by the county council with a new road. Building this road will encourage car use thereby eliminating massive carbon emissions reductions and failure as an eco-town
• China Clay community scheme near St Austell, Cornwall: The sustainability of this scheme depends on detailed design and integration of transport needs from the start
• Whitehill-Bordon, Hampshire: While this site is not on a railway, it easily could be. There should be a feasibility study on reopening the rail line as part of this new development

We’re calling for eco-towns to be adjacent to, if not actually within, existing urban centres and it is essential for them to be connected to by rail or light rail and not just by bus to avoid expanding the capacity of the trunk road network. Outside large towns and cities, few residents will choose to live without a car if buses provide their only links to the rail network. Eco towns should be integrated with and functioning as part of a larger conurbation, or, in the longer term, self-sufficient towns, which are large enough to provide for the great majority of their residents’ needs. Proposals should only proceed if they can be served by rail or light rail and avoid expanding the capacity of the trunk road network

A new search should be undertaken for more sustainable sites. These may be integrated sites identified through the normal planning process or (if necessary) a national search for a larger self-sufficient eco-town. We also believe Communities and Local Government should apply the eco-town principles to a new programme of eco quarters on redevelopment sites within existing towns and cities. In October 2008 we published a checklist (PDF, 756K) for creating sustainable new developments.

Campaign for Better Transport was part of the Government’s eco-towns challenge panel and contributed to the first set of recommendations (PDF, 190K) published in June 2008. Working with other environmental organisations, we submitted a response to a public consultation about the eco-towns (PDF, 142K) and a further response in April (PDF, 150K). The result is that the planning policy for eco-towns has moved in the right direction, as we suggested:

• It has accepted that the eco-towns should not be 'separate and distinct', as previously proposed, but should give 'consideration to proximity of higher order centres' where there is capacity for public transport links and other sustainable access to that centre
• It has endorsed the principle of ‘filtered permeability’ to promote walking and cycling
• The policy has effectively accepted our argument that eco-towns should be on the rail network (three of the selected eco-town locations are already on rail and there is to be a feasibility study for the re-opening of a rail link to the fourth)