Transport Policy and the Environment

Transport, in particular the motor vehicle, is a major source of environmental disruption and, in the developed world, accounts for 30 per cent of energy consumption. In most countries, transport policy is a major government concern, yet it is rare for decisions to be made outside a narrow set of sectoral considerations. This book, commissioned by the OECD, looks at seven countries; the UK, the USA, West Germany, France, The Netherlands, Greece and Italy. Each case demonstrates, in different ways, the problems in transport policies produced by the failure is a consequence of departmental division: transport, the environment, the exchequer, etc. all have their own, quite separate ministries.Here, a group of economists have demonstrated both the folly of such partial ways of thinking and, in writing their critiques of specific disaster, have provided models for ways forward.