The motorway age (1955–79) - Transport Policy and Planning in Great Britain - page 75

5 The motorway age (1955-79)

5.1 Introduction
The period 1955-79 does not neatly demarcate the building of motorways. The
first section of motorway (the Preston bypass section of the M6) was opened in late
1958 and the last major new publicly-funded motorway - the M40 from Oxford to
Birmingham - was opened in 1991. Widening of existing motorways and upgrading
of all-purpose dual carriageways to motorway standard (such as much of the A1) has
continued since. But the main period of motorway building symbolised the transition
to a transport world dominated by mass car ownership that is recognisably similar to
the one we inhabit today.
A similar boldness characterised the planning of towns during the same period.
Extensive schemes for 'urban renewal' incorporated plans to restructure highway
networks and to insert a new tier of roads geared to the requirements of motorised
traffic. Enthusiasm was relatively short-lived however as the results started to appear
on the ground and the social, environmental and financial costs of these grand designs
came to be recognised.
More sophisticated and holistic arguments about transport came to be advanced at
the same time as the economic fall-out from the oil price increases of the mid-1970s
had to be addressed. The language of many official publications of this time has much
more in common with the 'sustainable transport' rhetoric used today than the more
confident but mechanistic arguments used at the beginning of the motorway age.
In this chapter we consider first the inter-urban road programme which was the
hallmark of the new era (5.2) and then the rationalisation of the rail network which, in
complementary fashion, marked the ending of the previous one (5.3). In the following
sections we deal with aspects of urban planning - post-war town planning policy (5.4),
the Traffic in Towns report and its aftermath (5.5), the emergence of more integrated
'urban transport planning' (5.6) and, within this, the demise of urban motorways
(5.7). Section 5.8 deals with the measures taken in response to new social concerns
in the transport field. We conclude with the onset of resource constraints in the mid-
1970s which brought the long post-war period marked by steadily rising prosperity to
a distinctive close (5.9).

5.2 The inter-urban motorway programme
Prior to World War II the Ministry of Transport had resisted calls for the building of
purpose-built motorways on the basis of insufficient traffic. The development of the