Royal Commission on London Traffic

The Royal Commission on London Traffic was a Royal commission established in 1903 with a remit to review and report on how transport systems should be developed for London and the surrounding area. It produced a report in eight volumes published in 1905 and made recommendations on the character, administration and routing of traffic in London.

The Area of the Metropolitan Police District (pink shade) corresponding to the "Greater London" area within which the Royal Commission reviewed traffic arrangements

Establishment

The Royal Commission on London Traffic was established on 10 February 1903. It had 13 commissioners and was chaired by Sir David Barbour. Its secretary was Lynden Macassey and the other commissioners were:[1]

Remit

The Commission's remit was to report on London's traffic arrangements and:
(a) as to measures which the Commission deem most effectual for the improvement of the same by the development and inter-connexion of Railways and Tramways on, or below, the surface; by increasing the facilities for other forms of mechanical locomotion; by better provision for the organization and regulation of vehicular and pedestrian traffic, or otherwise;
(b) as to the desirability of establishing some authority or tribunal to which all schemes of Railway or Tramway construction of a local character should be referred, and the powers which it could be advisable to confer on such a body.[3]

The area of the Commission's scope covered the Metropolitan Police District,[lower-alpha 2] an area of 692.84 square miles (1,794.4 km2) and a population of more than 6.5 million in 1901.[3] In its report the Commission described this as "Greater London" and the urban developed area at its centre as "the Metropolis". The area beyond the Metropolis was described as "Extra London".[4]

Investigation

The Commission held 112 meetings and interviewed 134 witnesses. Members of the Commission carried out fact-finding visits to New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington in 1903 and to Vienna, Budapest, Prague, Cologne, Dresden, Berlin, Brussels and Paris in 1904.[5]

An Advisory Board of three engineers was appointed to give the Commission technical advice. The board consisted of Sir John Wolfe Barry (also a member of the Commission), Sir Benjamin Baker, former President of the Institution of Civil Engineers, and William Barclay Parsons, Chief Engineer to the Board of Rapid Transit Railroad Commissioners of the City of New York.[6]

Report and recommendations

The Commission's Report, Report of the Royal Commission Appointed to Inquire Into and Report Upon the Means of Locomotion and Transport in London, was published in eight volumes on 17 July 1905.[7][lower-alpha 3]

The Report examined the historic development of road, rail and tram transportation and the current condition. It made recommendations for improvements to roads within London's central area and arterial roads; for improvements in tramways including new routes and for improvements in railways of all types including their connections to one another. Recommendations were made as on road traffic regulations and the Commission recommended the establishment of a Traffic Board to manage traffic developments in the Greater London area and carry out preliminary reviews of bills for traffic schemes before they were submitted to parliament.[9]

Roads

The Report identified that road traffic was constrained by the narrowness of many of London's roads which reflected the historic development of the city.[10][lower-alpha 4]

The Report recommended that a comprehensive plan should be developed to improve road provision and routing to be carried out over the long term and that new roads should be constructed to standard widths depending on their importance and that existing main routes should be widened when possible.[lower-alpha 5]

Sketch from the Report showing a cross section through one of the proposed Main Avenues with trams and road traffic on the surface and railway lines beneath

The Advisory Board recommended construction of two "Main Avenues". These would be 140 feet (43 m) wide between buildings with four tram lines on the road and four railway lines in a sub-surface tunnel immediately beneath. Two of the tram lines and two of the railway lines would be for express services and service tunnels would be provided for utilities beneath the 23-foot (7.0 m) wide pavements.[12] The Main Avenues would connect areas on the outskirts of the main urban area and tramways and railway lines would be connected to these at both ends:[13]

The Main Avenues would cross at Gray's Inn Road.[12] Definitive routes were not proposed, but the Report recognised that the scale of the projects would require them to be carried out as a complete exercise. The cost of both Main Avenues was estimated to be £30 million (equivalent to approximately £3.25 billion today)[14] for the 9 miles (14 km) of new roads, tramways and railways.[13]

Map showing the routes recommended for improvement (Red: Main Avenues, Blue Other Recommendations)

Other main road improvements recommended by the Advisory Board were:[15]

The Report indicated that there were many other roads and junctions that required improvements including for main roads leading out of London. For the latter the Report recommended that this should be a responsibility for the Traffic Board to report on when established.[18] Although it did not make any recommendations on the subjects, the Report noted that submissions made to the Commission, included suggestions for "making roads in different directions out of London", "constructing a circular road about 75 miles in length at a radius of 12 miles from St Paul's", "providing alternative streets parallel to crowded thoroughfares, and new streets" and "removing factories from London".[10]

Tramways

The Report identified that the existing tramway systems were fragmented and lacked connections.[19][lower-alpha 10] Compared to other British cities, Greater London's tramway systems were significantly under-developed.[19][lower-alpha 11] The report criticised the London County Council's (LCC's) policy of refusing to allow the privately owned tramways operating outside the county's boundary to connect to and operate over its municipally owned system within. It also criticised the failure of the County to join its three separate systems together and to allow trams in the central areas of the City of London and the West End.[20][lower-alpha 12]

The Report recommended that interconnection of the existing tramways be undertaken and recommended construction of many new routes in areas not served and that through running of services between different operators be allowed. The Report recommended that vetos held by the London County Council and the municipal boroughs within it over the construction of new tramways should be abolished.[21][lower-alpha 13]

The Advisory Board recommended the construction of 23 new tramways to connect the separate systems and bring trams to unserved areas. It estimated that the cost of constructing double line tramways was four to five per cent of the cost of constructing a cut and cover line such as the Metropolitan Railway or 13 to 17 per cent of the cost of a deep-level tube line such as the Central London Railway.[23][lower-alpha 14]

Map showing the routes recommended for new tramways to connect existing or planned routes

The new routes recommended by the Advisory Board were:[26]

With the exception of Route 8 and the southern end of Route 1 and the northern parts of Routes 6 and 23 which crossed the county boundary, all of the routes were in the County of London.

Railways
1899 Map of railways around central London, showing termini and connecting lines

The Report noted that the Commission considered that the purpose of railways was to bring passengers from the residential districts into the urban centre. A survey of traffic usage calculated the estimated total number of journeys for 1903 as 310,662,501 (27,364,209 from the west, 51,838,742 from the north, 89,224,298 from the east, 75,487,731 from the south-east and 66,717,521 from the south-west).[27][lower-alpha 17]

Within the urban centre, trams and buses were considered to be the most convenient form of mass transport.[29] The Commission excluded railway goods traffic from its consideration noting only that the distribution of most retail goods within the centre on London was by road as the railways could not compete due to convenience and cost. A desire was expressed that this was better organised to reduce its contribution on traffic congestion, but no solution was proposed.[30]

The Report noted that most suburban and long distance passengers arrived at the same termini and that government policy of prohibiting railways from entering central London meant that the many railway companies then in operation had developed a messy network of lines in the periphery to connect to one another.[31][lower-alpha 18][lower-alpha 19] The Report noted that the Commission considered the way in which the termini had been located around the central area and the way that the railway companies' lines had been connected to one another were the main causes of deficiencies in the railways.[34]

The Commission set itself three questions with regard to the provision of railways: were additional railways needed in the London area and should they be deep-level, sub-surface or surface lines; were the existing suburban rail services sufficient and was special encouragement or assistance needed for future railway construction.[34][35]

The Report noted that deep-level underground lines under construction (Baker Street and Waterloo Railway, Charing Cross, Euston and Hampstead Railway and Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway) or planned would provide additional connections with many of the termini not already connected which would facilitate passengers' onward journeys into the central area. It considered that these new lines would mitigate many of the existing problems, but recommended that connections between north-south and east-west lines be provided and that connections between the suburban networks on the east and west sides of the central area be improved including by way of the Main Avenues proposed for the road and tram improvements. The only new deep-level line recommended was from Victoria station northwards to alleviate what was expected to remain a problem for passengers travelling into the central area. The Report recommended that a north-south line be provided from Victoria to Marble Arch where the approved but unbuilt North West London Railway was to terminate.[35][36][lower-alpha 20]

To improve east-west connections, the Advisory Board recommended connecting Hammersmith to the City of London via Kensington, Piccadilly and the Strand either by an underground railway or as a tramway (Routes 2 and 3 above).[40][lower-alpha 21]

The other main recommendation was that construction of railways in London should continue to be funded by private enterprise, but that parliament should provide a favourable system of procedures to encourage bills to be promoted as easily as possible.[41] The commission also recommended that parliament should avoid imposing additional financial burdens on the proposals, such as the cost of reconstructing roads and should allow railway companies to buy land around their proposed new extensions in order to benefit from the increase in land prices and to profit from the new services they provide.[42]

Traffic Board

The Report identified the need for a unified system for the "general control of measures affecting locomotion and transport in London", but considered it inappropriate for any of the existing authorities within the region to fulfil this role or for it to be established as a committee composed of representatives of the multiple authorities. It, therefore, recommended that a new authority, a "Traffic Board", be established. The Report recommended that the board partially replace the existing parliamentary process of scrutinising private bills for transport proposals in the Greater London area. The Report's recommendation was that the board should have the powers for:[43]

  • Control of traffic
  • Regulation of the opening up of streets
  • Removal of obstructions to traffic
  • Provision of new railway lines and tramways
  • Monitoring of road maintenance by local authorities and identification of failures
  • Preliminary examination and reporting on of private bills before submission to Parliament[lower-alpha 22]
  • Hold annual sessions and produce an annual report but be generally in continuous operation

With regards to the construction of new transport systems, The Report considered that the Traffic Board might function in a similar supervisory capacity to the Rapid Transit Railroad Commissioners of New York or the Rapid Transit Commission of Boston.[44]

The Report recommended that The Traffic Board should have a chairman and two to three other members. Because of the small number of members, The Report considered nomination by the local authorities within the Greater London area to be inappropriate as not all would be represented. Therefore the board's members should be directly appointed by the government.[45]

The costs of the board should be covered by a fees and a levy on the local authorities within the Greater London area paid from the local rates.[46]

Minority reports

Two of the Commission's members issued their own reports; a third member issued an additional recommendation. Bartley felt that the main report did not go far enough in its recommendations and he wanted the full adoption of the Advisory Board's recommendation for the construction of a pair of grand avenues. Dimsdale, rejected the main report's recommendation for tram routes in central London. Gibb's additional recommendation was that part of the route of the then under construction Great Northern, Piccadilly & Brompton Railway should be merged with a planned route from the Central London Railway to form a looping line.[47][lower-alpha 23]

Afterwards

The Report's recommendations were acted on in a limited manner. The recommendation for an all-encompassing Traffic Board was not adopted, although the London and Home Counties Traffic Advisory Committee was established in 1924 to oversee road traffic in the London Traffic Area.

Amongst the recommendations for road improvements, the new east-west and north-south Main Avenues were not constructed. A number of the proposed road improvements were carried out:

  • Marylebone Road was extended west to a new junction with Edgware Road in the 1960s in conjunction with the construction of the Marylebone Flyover and the Westway
  • The Mall was extended to Charing Cross in 1912 when Admiralty Arch was constructed
  • The western end of Constitution Hill was rearranged when Hyde Park Corner was replanned in the 1960s for the Hyde Park Underpass
  • The extension of West Cromwell Road and widening of King Street, Hammersmith were dealt with in the 1960s by the construction of the new A4 road starting at West Cromwell Road, including widening of Talgarth Road and construction of the Hammersmith Flyover
  • The widening or replacement of Brentford High Street was dealt with in the 1920s by the construction of the Great West Road starting at Chiswick
  • Instead of a viaduct from Waterloo Bridge to Wellington Street the disused Kingsway tramway subway was converted in 1964 to the Strand Underpass connecting northbound traffic from Waterloo Bridge to Kingsway
  • Marble Arch was widened in the 1960s when Park Lane was widened

The tramway system was gradually improved into a more integrated system. By the mid-1910s, the three independent tram companies were owned by the London and Suburban Traction Company which was jointly owned by the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (UERL) and British Electric Traction.

Review and approval of all new railway lines or extensions to existing lines continued to be carried out by parliament. The three underground lines under construction at the time the Commission sat opened in 1906 and 1907 and were owned, along with the District Railway, by the UERL. From 1913, the UERL also controlled the Central London Railway and the City and South London Railway. Extensions of all of the lines were proposed and built during the 1910s to 1930s. From 1910, the UERL also owned the largest bus company in London, the London General Omnibus Company.

Consolidation of the mainline railway companies continued and under the Railways Act 1921 they were merged into the Big Four in 1923.[lower-alpha 24] Under the London Passenger Transport Act 1933, the UERL, the Metropolitan Railway, the municipal tram operators and all bus operators in the London region were amalgamated under the single control of the London Passenger Transport Board in 1934.

Further studies that considered the improvement of traffic in London were carried out. Sir Charles Bressey with Sir Edwin Lutyens considered road improvements in The Highway Development Survey (1938) and Sir Patrick Abercrombie's County of London Plan (1943) and Greater London Plan (1944) included recommendations on rail and road transport.

See also

Notes and references

Notes
  1. Earl Cawdor resigned from the Commission in March 1905 to become First Lord of the Admiralty.[2]
  2. The Metropolitan Police District included the City of London, County of London, and all civil parishes in the counties of Essex, Kent, Hertfordshire, Middlesex and Surrey that were completely within 15 miles or which were partly within 12 miles of Charing Cross.
  3. The volumes of the report were titled:[8]
    I – Report of the Royal Commission on London Traffic with Index and Plans
    II – Minutes of Evidence Taken by the Royal Commission on London Traffic with Index and Digest
    III – Appendices to the Evidence Taken by the Royal Commission on London Traffic with Index
    IV – Appendices to the Report of the Royal Commission on London Traffic with Index
    V – Maps and Diagrams furnished to or prepared by the Royal Commission on London Traffic with Index
    VI – Maps and Diagrams furnished to the Royal Commission on London Traffic with Index
    VII – Report to the Royal Commission on London Traffic by the Advisory Board of Engineers with Index
    VIII – Appendix to the Report to the Royal Commission on London Traffic by the Advisory Board of Engineers with Index.
  4. The Report noted that average road speeds in quiet periods were 8 miles per hour (13 km/h) which reduced to 4.5 miles per hour (7.2 km/h) at busy times.[10]
  5. Measured between buildings including footpaths on each side, the standard road widths proposed were:[11]
    "Main Avenues": 140 feet (43 m)
    "First-class Arterial Streets": 100 feet (30 m)
    "Second-class Streets": 80 feet (24 m)
    "Third-class Streets": 60 feet (18 m)
    "Fourth-class Streets": 40–50 feet (12–15 m)
  6. The Report made particular note that Brentford High Street was the main road out of London to Slough, Reading and the west of England and that the width of the carriageway was just 19 feet (5.8 m) wide.[16]
  7. The cost was estimated to be £700,000 (equivalent to approximately £75.7 million today).[14][17]
  8. The cost was estimated to be £325,000 (equivalent to approximately £35.2 million today).[14][17]
  9. The section from Berkeley Square to Piccadilly would have required the purchase of parts of the gardens of Lansdowne House and Devonshire House and possibly the demolition of the latter.
  10. At the end of 1904, Greater London had 203.33 miles (327.23 km) of tramways in operation and 146.85 miles (236.33 km) approved.[19]
  11. The comparison was made on an inhabitant per mile basis. Greater London had 33,661 inhabitants per mile compared to Manchester with 8,937 and Glasgow with 14,216.[19]
  12. The report identified that the time taken to turn trams around at their termini reduced the potential capacity of the system by about 50% and caused substantial road congestion.[20]
  13. The London County Council and the municipal boroughs could each veto the others plans for new tramways and also plans by private operators.[22]
  14. The Advisory Board's estimations of costs for underground railways were very approximate: "a million a mile" for cut and cover tunnels under busy roads or from "£250,000 to £300,000 per mile" for deep-level lines. The latter was only on the basis that "stations were few in number, the land obtained for nothing and exceptional facilities granted for the work". The cost of constructing a double line of tramways was reported by the London County Council to be £39,512 per mile for routes with power proved from overhead wires and £52,602 per mile for routes with power provided from conduit in the roadway.[24] For tramways running in subways below streets, the cost of construction was estimated to be comparable to that of a cut and cover railway tunnel rising to as much as £1 million in specific locations.[25]
  15. Although included in the recommendations of the Advisory Board, the construction of the Route 3 tramway from Knightsbridge (Albert Gate) to Aldgate as a subway was considered too expensive to be practical, particularly as the Great Northern, Piccadilly & Brompton Railway (now part of the Piccadilly line) was under construction between Knightsbridge and Leicester Square.[25]
  16. The cost of constructing the Route 16 tramway in a tunnel under the river was considered not justified whilst expenditure on other proposals was required.[25]
  17. Liverpool Street station was the busiest of all of the stations with an estimated 65,299,450 passengers.[28]
  18. At the time of the report, London had 13 mainline railway termini served by ten railway companies:
    1. Fenchurch Street (Great Eastern Railway and London, Tilbury and Southend Railway)
    2. Liverpool Street (Great Eastern Railway)
    3. King's Cross (Great Northern Railway)
    4. St Pancras (Midland Railway)
    5. Euston (London and North Western Railway)
    6. Marylebone (Great Central Railway)
    7. Paddington (Great Western Railway)
    8. London Bridge (London, Brighton and South Coast Railway)
    9. Cannon Street (South Eastern and Chatham Railway)
    10. Holborn Viaduct (South Eastern and Chatham Railway)
    11. Charing Cross (South Eastern and Chatham Railway)
    12. Waterloo (London and South Western Railway)
    13. Victoria (London, Brighton and South Coast Railway and South Eastern and Chatham Railway).[31]
    Additionally, Broad Street served as the terminus of the suburban North London Railway.
  19. The prohibition on railways entering the central area was made in 1846 following recommendations of the Royal Commission investigation into Metropolitan Railway Termini.[32][33] The only exception to this was the line from Blackfriars to Farringdon via the Snow Hill tunnel.
  20. The North West London Railway had obtained parliamentary approval in 1899 for a line from Cricklewood to Marble Arch.[37] In 1903, the company submitted a bill for an extension of its route from Marble Arch to Victoria, which was postponed during the Commission's investigation and was resubmitted and approved in 1906.[38] The line was never built. Benjamin Baker, who was a member of the Advisory Board, was a promoter of the company.[39]
  21. Several competing proposals for underground railway lines had been presented to parliament for lines connecting these points including the Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway's line, which began construction in 1902 and opened in 1906.
  22. The Traffic Board was to make its own decision as to how extensive this examination and reporting should be.
  23. Dimsdale and Gibb signed the main report, Bartley did not.[2]
  24. The Big Four were the Great Western Railway, London, Midland and Scottish Railway, London and North Eastern Railway and Southern Railway.

References
  1. Barbour 1905, pp. iii–v.
  2. Barbour 1905, p. 105.
  3. Badsey-Ellis 2005, pp. 222–23.
  4. Barbour 1905, pp. 3 & 50.
  5. Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 222.
  6. Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 229.
  7. Badsey-Ellis 2005, pp. 222 & 223.
  8. Barbour 1905, p. vi.
  9. Barbour 1905, p. 99.
  10. Barbour 1905, p. 33.
  11. Barbour 1905, p. 34.
  12. Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 230.
  13. Barbour 1905, pp. 35–36.
  14. UK Retail Price Index inflation figures are based on data from Clark, Gregory (2017). "The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)". MeasuringWorth. Retrieved 2 February 2020.
  15. Barbour 1905, pp. 37–38.
  16. Barbour 1905, p. 37.
  17. Barbour 1905, p. 38.
  18. Barbour 1905, p. 40.
  19. Barbour 1905, p. 41.
  20. Barbour 1905, p. 42.
  21. Barbour 1905, p. 54.
  22. Barbour 1905, pp. 52–54.
  23. Barbour 1905, pp. 44–47.
  24. Barbour 1905, p. 44.
  25. Barbour 1905, p. 48.
  26. Barbour 1905, pp. 45–47.
  27. Barbour 1905, pp. 64-65.
  28. Barbour 1905, p. 65.
  29. Barbour 1905, p. 55.
  30. Barbour 1905, p. 57.
  31. Barbour 1905, p. 59.
  32. Simpson 2003, p. 7.
  33. "Metropolitan Railway Termini". The Times (19277). 1 July 1846. p. 6. Retrieved 1 January 2020.
  34. Barbour 1905, p. 63.
  35. Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 225.
  36. Barbour 1905, p. 68.
  37. Badsey-Ellis 2005, pp. 79-82.
  38. Badsey-Ellis 2005, pp. 220-221, 266.
  39. Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 78.
  40. Barbour 1905, p. 69.
  41. Barbour 1905, p. 70.
  42. Barbour 1905, p. 71.
  43. Barbour 1905, pp. 98-100.
  44. Barbour 1905, pp. 100-101.
  45. Barbour 1905, pp. 101-102.
  46. Barbour 1905, p. 102.
  47. Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 226.

Bibliography
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