A1 ROAD (MIDDLESEX) (Hansard, 30 April 1971)

§ Sir Ronald Russell (Wembley, South)

The subject which I wish to raise on the Adjournment tonight is the dualling of the A1 in Middlesex and Hertfordshire, and particularly the failure to dual a small section of that road between South Mimms and Hatfield. I am most grateful to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary for being here to answer the debate. I assure him that I am not complaining at him and his right hon. Friend, but to him, because he and his right hon. Friend have been responsible for this section of road only since last June, and the problem which I wish to mention goes back much further than that.

It is more than three years ago that I started tabling Questions about this stretch of road, and I have asked about a dozen since then. But before that the A.A. was in correspondence with the Ministry about it and a great many letters have passed to and fro; alas, without result. In the last twelve years, a great deal of work has been done on the roads of the country and a vast amount of progress has been made, as nobody would deny, not only with the building of motorways, but with the dualling of existing trunk roads. Nearly the whole of the Al between Hendon and Tyneside is now dual carriageway. There are about seven 974 short gaps which are not, two in Hertfordshire and the rest rather further out. What I find completely incomprehensible is that this section between South Mimms and Hatfield is apparently being left to the last, this despite the fact that the land needed for dualling it is already there on each side of the existing carriageway.

Indeed, it was presumably provided by the Conservative Government of 1924–29 when they approved construction of this section of what used to be called the Barnet Bypass nearly 50 years ago. The only mistake my hon. Friend's predecessors of those days made was the decision to build a single carriageway of this stretch in the middle of the land reserved for eventual widening, instead of building it to one side, as was done with the A10, which was called the Cambridge New Road and which was opened a few years after the Barnet Bypass. This road is overloaded. It has a 50 m.p.h. speed limit and a high accident rate.

To deal with the question of overloading, it was estimated in 1970 that the annual flow of vehicles on this stretch was 7,750,000. The highest 16-hour flow was 25,206 vehicles in June, 1969. I am told that is the equivalent of 31,200 passenger car units which, I gather, includes lorries broken up into two or three as may be necessary to make them the equivalent of a car. I understand the design capacity of this road, which is 33 feet wide, is for 15,000 passenger car units only. Therefore, it is overloaded to the extent of 108 per cent.

The 50 m.p.h. limit speaks for itself when the limit on most sections of the rest of the Al, between Hendon and Tyneside, is 70 m.p.h. The accident rate speaks for itself too. I have asked a number of Questions about this matter in the last three years and I would summarise the Answers as follows. From January, 1965 to December, 1970 there were 365 accidents involving personal injury on this stretch of road, which is at a rate of one every six days. Of those accidents 24 were fatal accidents and 122 serious. The severity ratio, which I gather is the total of fatal plus serious accidents divided by the total of slight accidents, is 66.7 per cent. This compares with an average of 32 per cent. for the county of Hertfordshire as a whole.

975 It is illuminating to compare the accident rate on that stretch of road with that on dual carriageway sections of the Al. Again, taking my calculations from Questions which were answered for me during the period of Labour Government in 1970, the situation is as follows. Over five-mile stretches of dual carriageway on the Al the average number of accidents on the dual carriageway sections were 16.5 per year compared with a figure on this section of 53. The number of persons killed averaged one per year compared with four per year on this stretch; the number of people seriously injured was 6.4 compared with 37; the number of slightly injured was 16.7 compared with 62. These figures speak for themselves.

Finally in regard to the accident figures, on 18th March last a lorry was travelling northwards along this stretch of the road when the container it was carrying toppled off on the right-hand side and crushed three cars travelling in the opposite direction. Two of the drivers were killed instantly, the third died in hospital a few hours later, a passenger in one of the cars was slightly injured and the driver of the lorry was also slightly injured. This could not possibly have happened if the road had been dual carriageway. Therefore, it is at least in part the result of the Ministry's policy in recent years not to do anything about dualling this section.

I have been told that this is a question of priorities. It is difficult to understand why this stretch, which is the nearest of all to London that is not dualled, should be left until last. We have also been told that delay has been caused by a comprehensive traffic survey of the North-West London area, which apparently has postponed decision on it for 12 months. When I asked what difference that survey could make I was told that the Ministry could not decide on the lay-out of the junctions without knowing the results of the survey. That is understandable, but we could have had dual carriageways on this section years ago without waiting for a junction because the land is already there and obviously has got to be dualled anyway. There was obviously no need to wait for the dualling, even if the junctions had to be left to the last.

976 That is in striking contrast to the next single carriageway section north of Hatfield, where the problem is much more difficult because the land is not readily available. I now understand that a new road to motorway standard is to replace the existing road both north and south of Hatfield. But no date has yet been given for the start of the section South of Hatfield—nor do we know anything about its completion. I presume that the existing single-carriageway section is not to be dualled, so it will be three or four more years at least of accidents at the rate which I have quoted—one every six days—while this delay goes on.

Has a decision been taken to build a motorway on another line, because it is now impossible to dual the existing road without causing enormous traffic congestion while the work is being carried out? I could understand that: I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to confirm that the answer is so.

There is a quotation, which I have not been able to check, to the effect that the perfect best is the enemy of the practical good. I am not sure that this is not a case of having to wait for the perfect best when we could have had the practical good many years ago. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to give the good news that this dangerous road will be dualled at an early date. Otherwise, it will stand out like a sore thumb as the only stretch of single carriageway between London and Tyneside.

§ The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Michael Heseltine)

I hope that it will not offend you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, or the House, if I have this large map in front of me. This is a complicated matter, and if my hon. Friend should seek to interrupt me, I should be helped by a visual presentation.

There is no disagreement about the sort of problems which my hon. Friend the Member for Wembley, South (Sir R. Russell) has raised or the time which their resolution has taken. My hon. Friend approaches this matter as one who is concerned to represent his constituents. His surprise is understandable—surprise that the road should have been greatly improved in those areas where perhaps the traffic flow was not so heavy or the accidents so frequent. The answer 977 must be that it is easier to improve roads in rural than in densely populated areas.

Given this as the general parameter within which the Department must operate, it is true that the closer we get to London and the more densely populated the areas, the harder the job. More consultation and examination are necessary and more people are affected. There is no possible alternative to these problems but delay.

I accept that delay is undesirable, but we are subjected to as much pressure from people who say that we have not given sufficient research and consideration to schemes as we are from people who say that we should get on with the particular proposal faster. It is a fair generalisation that my hon. Friend represents an area which comes very much within these problems.

It is our announced and well-known policy to improve the Al from London to the North to dual-carriageway standard, and the vast majority of this has been completed. We are now in the difficult situation of approaching residential London and the neighbouring communities. There is about 25 miles of roadway in this section which would require some £22½ million to bring it to the dual standards which we have announced. Of these 25 miles, some 15½ miles have already been completed, leaving 9½ to come.

It is interesting to note that the 15½ mile stretch already completed cost only £7½ million, whereas the 9 miles remaining will cost about £15 million. This is a direct indication of the complexity of the building programme we face.

My hon. Friend will be aware that on the sections we are discussing, the Baldock by-pass was completed in 1967, the Stevenage section in 1962 and the Stanborough diversion also in 1967. This leaves three schemes still unfinished, and it might be helpful if I explained the sort of progress that is likely on these.

The first scheme is that which joins Welwyn to Stanborough, near Hatfield. This is approximately a two-mile section which will cost about £3½ million. The Secretary of State made orders for this as recently as January, 1971, and last Friday the compulsory purchase orders were published. Advance work on minor diversions to avoid delays on the A1 978 when the main work starts is expected to begin next week, and it is hoped that the main work will start in 1972.

The second scheme is the Hatfield to South Mimms section, which although in two schemes, adds up to a total of 6½ miles and will cost approximately £10 million. I believe that this is the section of the road with which my hon. Friend is particularly concerned. We are working concurrently on the two schemes, one dealing with the section between Cecil Road and Roestock and the other from Roestock to Stanborough. The schemes were put into the Preparation Pool in 1967–68 and since then a comprehensive traffic study has been carried out. There are still detailed investigations to be done, including soil surveys and other technical studies, and these are under way.

The programme we have in mind, if all goes well—there is always a danger that by giving these dates one will raise hopes, and more difficulties will arise; if one does not give dates one may appear not to be interested in the matter—is to publish the routes for these two sections later this year. I hope that this information is acceptable to my hon. Friend.

From that time on we must start the statutory processes, with the possibility of public inquiries, followed by the final decision of the Secretary of State. Assuming that the statutory processes go well, the work could start some time in 1973, and that would be for the second section between Hatfield and South Mimms, completing about 6½ miles of roadway.

The third section is known as the South Mimms diversion which, on the A1, refers to a very small section of road, but it was published in connection with a much larger section of another route which runs into it. A public inquiry into this approximately one-mile section, which is estimated to cost about £1½ million, was held in October, 1969, to satisfy, reconcile and ventilate the strong local feeling that the South Mimms diversion proposal created.

There is not the slightest doubt that this is a difficult and controversial matter. It is one which has received, and is continuing to receive, the very closest scrutiny by Ministers, in view of 979 the strong representations that were put to us. It is our hope that we shall be able to announce our decision shortly and, subject to this timetable being maintained, and whether we decide to go ahead with the proposals along the proposed published route or decide to improve the existing road, it is possible that the work could begin in late 1972 on this third section.

My hon. Friend asked a number of detailed questions and said that as a lot of land is available on the Hatfield-South Mimms section, it should have been possible for us to go ahead with the work a great deal earlier. It is true that a considerable amount of land is in hand, but it is not enough land to build the sort of road to the specifications we consider necessary. It will therefore be necessary to go through the various processes for the acquisition of the additional land.

My hon. Friend also suggested that we should consider the possibility of dividing the road into smaller units, getting on with such of those units as we could and leaving the junctions to a later date, having completed such dualling as we could. We all share my hon. Friend's very real concern about accidents, but I put it to him that this would be dangerous. The essence of creating long through roads, either dual or motorway, is the certainty of being able to make progress with the work without the danger of running into unexpected hazards. It would be dangerous greatly to improve 980 the travelling capacity of certain sections whilst leaving dangerous islands in existence. It is for this reason that we are not prepared to go ahead with piecemeal schemes until we can satisfy ourselves that the extent of our improvement is coherent in itself, and will not give rise to greater difficulties than those which my hon. Friend has mentioned today, and on many occasions.

We all know of my hon. Friend's concern about accidents. It is not only because of accidents that we are committed to the dualling of the road. It is the extent of the accidents—the sort of very serious and appalling accident that he has detailed today—that weighs so heavily on those in the Department who are responsible for planning, and on Ministers who have to consider the various representations made before decisions are taken.

I hope that I have answered the points put by my hon. Friend. Nothing would have given me greater pleasure than to have been able to say that we could go ahead even faster than I say we can, but in view of the dates I have been able to give, I hope that he will feel that, at least compatible with the preparation for the work he wants us to do, there is an end in sight to the pressures he has referred to in the House over a considerable period.