Gap in the market?

[Big J]

2 hours ago, Woodworks said:

I dont see he point of road upgrades here. To start with you would have to destroy 1000s  of miles of Devon hedgrows to do it and traffic just expands to fit the network so back to square one in a few years. Tight difficult lanes keeps many away ?

I disagree. I think that the tight lanes cost the local economy millions every year, as well as needlessly endangering the people traveling on them. Take out one hedge, leave the other, expanding the road to a standard width that will accommodate traffic easily for the next 50 years. Seems sensible to me!

 

Additionally, the tight lanes cause poorer fuel economy. I'm lucky if I get 42-45mpg with the little van in Devon, but I get 56-58mpg in Scotland. So (and these are approximate values) with approximately 468k vehicles in Devon doing 12k a year, that's 5.6 billion miles a year. At at average of 42mpg, thats 133.7m litres. At 52mpg that's 108m litres. As well as a direct cost of £33m to the economy, that's an extra 66000 tonnes of co2 into the atmosphere, which seems like a high environmental cost for the sake of some hedges.

[Conor Wright]

7 minutes ago, Big J said:

I disagree. I think that the tight lanes cost the local economy millions every year, as well as needlessly endangering the people traveling on them. Take out one hedge, leave the other, expanding the road to a standard width that will accommodate traffic easily for the next 50 years. Seems sensible to me!

 

Additionally, the tight lanes cause poorer fuel economy. I'm lucky if I get 42-45mpg with the little van in Devon, but I get 56-58mpg in Scotland. So (and these are approximate values) with approximately 468k vehicles in Devon doing 12k a year, that's 5.6 billion miles a year. At at average of 42mpg, thats 133.7m litres. At 52mpg that's 108m litres. As well as a direct cost of £33m to the economy, that's an extra 66000 tonnes of co2 into the atmosphere, which seems like a high environmental cost for the sake of some hedges.

Devils advocate here, would the hedgerows not take in a substantial amount of that co2? halving the amount of hedgerows to improve the road network will accommodate twice the amount of traffic (albeit at slightly better fuel economy). More vehicles  will add extra co2 emissions, leaving a higher carbon footprint due to the destruction of 50% of the nearest carbon absorbers.. never mind losing much of the aesthetic value of the area, habitat and heritage.

 

[doobin]

1 hour ago, Big J said:

I disagree. I think that the tight lanes cost the local economy millions every year, as well as needlessly endangering the people traveling on them. Take out one hedge, leave the other, expanding the road to a standard width that will accommodate traffic easily for the next 50 years. Seems sensible to me!

 

Additionally, the tight lanes cause poorer fuel economy. I'm lucky if I get 42-45mpg with the little van in Devon, but I get 56-58mpg in Scotland. So (and these are approximate values) with approximately 468k vehicles in Devon doing 12k a year, that's 5.6 billion miles a year. At at average of 42mpg, thats 133.7m litres. At 52mpg that's 108m litres. As well as a direct cost of £33m to the economy, that's an extra 66000 tonnes of co2 into the atmosphere, which seems like a high environmental cost for the sake of some hedges.

Mate, with the ability to magic up 'statistics' like that, you should work for the government! ?

 

Any idea how much it costs a mile to widen a road? What about the Co2 emmissions of doing so? Your proposal is pie in the sky unless you are a third world shithole, in which case the EU will pay for it all!

 

Above all else- it's not broke, so don't fix it. Move to Milton Keynes if you want massive great roads connecting everything.

 

[AHPP]

third world shithole
 

Let’s not bring Cornwall into this argument unnecessarily.

[Woodworks]

2 hours ago, Big J said:

I disagree. I think that the tight lanes cost the local economy millions every year, as well as needlessly endangering the people traveling on them. Take out one hedge, leave the other, expanding the road to a standard width that will accommodate traffic easily for the next 50 years. Seems sensible to me!

 

Additionally, the tight lanes cause poorer fuel economy. I'm lucky if I get 42-45mpg with the little van in Devon, but I get 56-58mpg in Scotland. So (and these are approximate values) with approximately 468k vehicles in Devon doing 12k a year, that's 5.6 billion miles a year. At at average of 42mpg, thats 133.7m litres. At 52mpg that's 108m litres. As well as a direct cost of £33m to the economy, that's an extra 66000 tonnes of co2 into the atmosphere, which seems like a high environmental cost for the sake of some hedges.

But those figures dont allow for extra traffic you would get with a better road network. Leave it as it is IMO. 

[Woodworks]

A quick google says "Devon County Council is responsible for 8,000 miles of road - the longest network in the country" 

 

how much of that is narrow lanes? Say it's half and that seems conservative so 4000miles of habitat rich hedgerow to rip out . Can you imagine how many landowners would have to cooperate to make it happen of the sh1t storm of compulsory purchasing it all to then destroy centuries old hedgerows.  Sorry J but its cloud cuckoo land.

[nepia]

Big J, that is a horribly cold way of looking at the issue.  Doing as you suggest would make the county not Devon any more; that fact alone outweighs any CO2/economic traffic etc argument for me.  Devon's a beautiful county; you'd wreck it for better mpg?!

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

3 hours ago, AHPP said:

 

Let’s not bring Cornwall into this argument unnecessarily.

 

Tnuc!

[Stubby]

1 hour ago, kevinjohnsonmbe said:

Tnuc!

It was funny though Kev ?

[Spruce Pirate]

Plenty of narrow roads on the continent:

 

On ‎10‎/‎08‎/‎2019 at 11:55, Big J said:

Most of the roads on the continent you wouldn't even think about the width of your vehicle. We haven't upgraded our roads to keep up with the development of vehicles in the UK.

 

 

 

7 hours ago, Big J said:

Additionally, the tight lanes cause poorer fuel economy. I'm lucky if I get 42-45mpg with the little van in Devon, but I get 56-58mpg in Scotland. So (and these are approximate values) with approximately 468k vehicles in Devon doing 12k a year, that's 5.6 billion miles a year. At at average of 42mpg, thats 133.7m litres. At 52mpg that's 108m litres. As well as a direct cost of £33m to the economy, that's an extra 66000 tonnes of co2 into the atmosphere, which seems like a high environmental cost for the sake of some hedges.

By now you really should have learned that everything is better up here!!!