Where does the money go?

Honest John Back Room » Motoring discussion
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 08:44
Where does the money go? - Dipstick
There are some new traffic lights being fitted to a local major roundabout. The costs are, according to the local council spokesman, about five million pounds, and will take a couple of months.

It's easy to get silly and say good grief, it's a dozen lightbulbs on sticks, but seriously - WHY do roadworks cost so much?

Wages? Five million would buy a heck of a lot of staff for eight weeks.

Machinery? How much IS a JCB? How many would 5 million buy? Would you buy fifty and throw them away after eight weeks?

Materials? Tarmac isn't liquid gold. I know traffic lights are computer controlled of course - so that's fifteen quid worth of chips made in China and some light bulbs then.

Profit margins? Is some private company making four point nine million pounds of public money on this project?

All those will contribute but to add up to five million!?

I just can't see where it gets spent. I'm not looking for "it's all those faceless bureaucrats drawing a salary" type answer - I genuinely wonder if anyone knows where the bulk of money goes on roadworks projects?

It's no use asking the council. They just say "contractor's costs" or some such and you have no more idea.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 08:53
Where does the money go? - cjehuk
Public Awarenesss, rerouting of traffic, surveying of other services in the road, road markings, light sequencing (this is a remarkably specialised career - a coursemate is going into traffic planning direct from a Civil Engineering masters and it's not a low paid role). Those are the bits that occur immediately anyway...
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 08:59
Where does the money go? - Round The Bend
Dipstick .... that sounds like the Thickthorn roundabout A11/A47 at Norwich. No idea how the council can under-estimate by so much (if this was the private sector someone would be out of a job) but you must admit that the lights have improved the traffic flow.
_______
IanS
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 09:01
Where does the money go? - Dipstick
Nope - not the Norwich ones. A10 roundabout at Cambridge. Job is in progress.

I don't have an axe to grind here particularly - I'm genuinely interested in getting an idea of how it costs that much money.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 08:54
Where does the money go? - peterb
It certainly doesn't end up as clear profit for the contractors - most contractors have an absolutely tiny profit margin.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 09:16
Where does the money go? - Honestjohn
Read 'The Bumper Book of Government Waste' by Matthew Elliot and Lee Rotherham, published by Harriman House, £9.99, tel: 0870 428 4115. Seems that this sort of thing, 'consultants', bogus jobs and useless timewasting government and civil service committees are where most taxpayers money goes, not on unemployment benefit and housing East European EU immigrants.

HJ
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 09:21
Where does the money go? - Altea Ego
Lets get to basics

This is a pet hate of mine

Its a roundabout

Roundabouts dont have lights.....were not designed for lights...the whoe idea of aroundabot get screwed if you have lights.......
------------------------------
TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 15:20
Where does the money go? - cheddar
Lets get to basics
This is a pet hate of mine
Its a roundabout
Roundabouts dont have lights.....were not designed for lights...the whoe idea of
aroundabot get screwed if you have lights.......



Quite right RF!
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 20:10
Where does the money go? - tack
Roundabouts dont have lights.....were not designed for lights...the whoe idea of
aroundabot get screwed if you have lights.......


Agreed.

Any of you know Redbridge roundabout? All entrances/exits have traffic signals except 1.

Park up & watch the race, boxing and coxing from the unsignalled road (Redbridge Lane) as traffic on the road to the right gets the green, whilst the traffic from next but one road to the right have already had their go and are partially blocking the exit from unsignalled road onto roundabout.

The bloke who thought that up must be on the funny farm now.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 20:37
Where does the money go? - Lud
There's a roundabout at the rural end of central Dorking that acquired a pedestrian traffic light right up against it a couple of years ago... anyone pressing on and not too bright (I include myself in this context) can get into real trouble there, light turns green and you blast through only to find it - yes! - a normal roundabout with stuff coming across you from the left. A real heart-stopper.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 20:39
Where does the money go? - Lud
stuff coming across you
from the left. A real heart-stopper.

>

Oh dear. I mean from the right.
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Mon 6 Mar 2006 10:37
Where does the money go? - J Bonington Jagworth
"This is a pet hate of mine
Its a roundabout"

Hear, hear! We only have one serious roundabout on the Isle of Wight, and from day one it was festooned with traffic lights. The only time it works properly (and it does) is when the lights are all off for maintenance, or as happened recently, to be renewed!
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 09:24
Where does the money go? - T Lucas
Contractors have just finished putting in 8 sets of pinch points and painted a mini roundabout on a road near me,i do not know the cost but this work has taken 10 months.Oh and then they had to come back and move one set because it was too close to a junction.If they had been building a house it would have taken them about 5 years.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 09:52
Where does the money go? - Aprilia
Read 'The Bumper Book of Government Waste' by Matthew Elliot and
Lee Rotherham, published by Harriman House, £9.99, tel: 0870 428
4115. Seems that this sort of thing, 'consultants', bogus jobs and
useless timewasting government and civil service committees are where most taxpayers
money goes, not on unemployment benefit and housing East European EU
immigrants.
HJ


This is everyone's favourite reason, of course. I'm sure that the government do waste a certain amount of money. However, I have to say that when I've been involved with the public sector (as a 'consultant' as it happens...) costs have been very carefully monitored and audited. Certainly they generally pay considerably less than the private sector.
If you want to see waste and bogus jobs then go and work for Ford of GM - those guys really know how to waste money.

A lot of public sector projects are big, complicated and unwieldy and so costs are hard to predict. When the private sector has a go they often get it wrong as well (think Channel Tunnel or Wembley Stadium). The government often has to step in and sort it out.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 17:07
Where does the money go? - Andrew-T
Aprilia - "when I've been involved with the public sector, costs have been very carefully monitored and audited"

Who does the auditing, how much does it cost, and who pays?
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 17:21
Where does the money go? - Lud
Aprilia - "when I've been involved with the public sector, costs
have been very carefully monitored and audited"
Who does the auditing, how much does it cost, and who
pays?


Another thing Aprilia, when people like you are involved they will check costs, partly because they don't want the gravy to be wasted on ordinary mugs... when it's a private meeting between porky councillors and porky building contractors everyone speaks the same language ('Pork') so no need for cautious behaviour.

I know this sounds like (and is) vulgar cynicism, but unbelievable sums are spent and remarkably little seems to result quite often. I am afraid we are a corrupt country, but remember that we are also world-renowned for hypocrisy. They go together beautifully.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 20:43
Where does the money go? - Aprilia
Aprilia - "when I've been involved with the public sector, costs
have been very carefully monitored and audited"
Who does the auditing, how much does it cost, and who
pays?


Indeed, I take the point. Accountants always seem to come off with money sticking to their 'non-productive' hands. I have heard it quoted that this country has 10x the number of accountants that Germany has. This is probably one reason for our lower productivity and the devastation of our manufacturing industry. We need more people doing real value-adding work and fewer accountants and auditors.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 21:16
Where does the money go? - Lud
Indeed, I take the point. Accountants always seem to come
off with money sticking to their 'non-productive' hands. I have
heard it quoted that this country has 10x the number of
accountants that Germany has.


Aprilia. Chapeau. What a horrendous statistic. Of course ordinary Germans can count. Evidently we can't.
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 00:36
Where does the money go? - Stuartli
>>Accountants always seem to come off with money sticking to their 'non-productive' hands. >>

Those who tried to cut down on costs used to be known as time and motion study experts....;-)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 14:33
Where does the money go? - Chris S
Aprilia - "when I've been involved with the public sector, costs
have been very carefully monitored and audited"
Who does the auditing, how much does it cost, and who
pays?


It reminds me of the story about the 1980's US Defense auditors who were told to find the fraud in a $500 hammer. They followed a paper trail of specifications, requisition orders (etc) and found it was actually a few cents under-priced!
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 19:16
Where does the money go? - drbe
If you want to see waste and bogus jobs then go
and work for Ford of GM - those guys really know
how to waste money.

Yes, but with Ford or GM, we have a choice, we do or don't buy their products.

My county council - Surrey - are a joke when it comes to expenditure and I can't see any way out of paying the stupid Community Charge.
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 20:09
Where does the money go? - Roly93
Read 'The Bumper Book of Government Waste' by Matthew Elliot and
Lee Rotherham, published by Harriman House, £9.99, tel: 0870 428
4115. Seems that this sort of thing, 'consultants', bogus jobs and
useless timewasting government and civil service committees are where most taxpayers
money goes, not on unemployment benefit and housing East European EU immigrants.


Quite right !
I can't be too specific for fear of compromising myself, but I have had first-hand business experience of regional and central governmental departments and their activities. They have a mindset that as long as you have spent millions on consultants, all is okay no matter what happens. If the public really knew how much these guys were blowing on consultants, whose intent is only to make the job last as long as possible (being on £1200 per day !).
Also, now when smaller companies decide to bid for government business, the cost overhead of dealing with the sheer quantity of regulations and paperwork is crippling, before you have even seen a single purchase-order !
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 06:34
Where does the money go? - R40
It certainly doesn't end up as clear profit for the contractors
- most contractors have an absolutely tiny profit margin.

>>

lol

But that is exactly where our taxpayers money does go isn't it?

This type of work is always done by private contractors nowadays. It seems that the works are always charged high and always take longer than they say. Private sector efficiencies? There's not much evidence.
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 08:13
Where does the money go? - mare
This type of work is always done by private contractors
nowadays. It seems that the works are always charged high and
always take longer than they say. Private sector efficiencies? There's not
much evidence.


This type of work is also frequently tendered competitively i.e. the lowest price wins. So the price charged is the market rate.

Price fixing does occasionally happen (proving it is another thing!), but only to save contractors spending time and money preparing a tender (a £4 million job could cost a contractor £20,000 to prepare). If prices were fixed and prices inflated, it would soon be spotted by the client team, as they will have done a budget.
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 18:34
Where does the money go? - Aprilia
This type of work is also frequently tendered competitively i.e. the
lowest price wins. So the price charged is the market rate.


Such faith. You obviously didn't watch that TV documentary (C4?)last year about cartels in the construction industry.....
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 22:26
Where does the money go? - mare
Such faith. You obviously didn't watch that TV documentary (C4?)last
year about cartels in the construction industry.....


I didn't see that programme.

I've passively experienced cartels (i can't see that i've been involved with!) three times in 14 years from both sides. Maybe some of the material prices are fixed (and perhaps that's what you mean), but a contractor couldn't fix the price and get away with it. Because on one of the above occasions, they were caught red handed, and lost a chunk of business as a result.
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 20:15
Where does the money go? - Roly93
Price fixing does occasionally happen (proving it is another thing!), but
only to save contractors spending time and money preparing a tender
(a £4 million job could cost a contractor £20,000 to prepare).
If prices were fixed and prices inflated, it would soon be
spotted by the client team, as they will have done a
budget.

£20,000 is very conservative when bidding for business of this type. Any government contract even for relatively simple stuff buries you under a mountain of commercial TS&C's which all have to be responded to and negotiated etc, which ties up much manpower.
Personally, I think if you are doing anything other than soft-skills work such as consultancy, it is hard to make much profit on these deals now.
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Tue 28 Feb 2006 08:17
Where does the money go? - mare
This type of work is always done by private contractors
nowadays. It seems that the works are always charged high and
always take longer than they say. Private sector efficiencies? There's not
much evidence.

Sorry to reply twice, but i also meant to say that these sort of works are the most unpredictable being that the existing condition of the ground is unknown unless you have x ray vision!

Problems encountered in working in the ground include:

1 - that pipe / cable shouldn't be there!
2 - what is that pipe / cable?
3 - On no, it's an asbestos pipe!
4 - Where's that water coming from?
5 - What's that petrol smell?
6 - Is this amulet early or late Bronze Age?

etc etc
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 09:32
Where does the money go? - mare
£5 million does sound a lot - is that figure just for that particular roundabout or a series of them. A NEW roundabout (without lights) would be £500-750k, whereas councils often opt for traffic lights because they cost c.£100k to introduce to a junction.

BTW, a JCB is about £250 a day with operator, and tarmac caqn be £35-50/m2, depending on the ground and use. Plus you need to allow for kerbs, drainage, signage, re-routing underground services, footpaths(?), new streetlighting (?), landscaping (?) and whitelining.

In terms of staff, there's obivously the labour, but there will be a site manager, QS, buyer and foreman, not to mention the engineer and also an engineer from the highways authority.

As for profit: on a £4 million building scheme, a contractor will charge 6.5% Overheads and Profit. Of that, 5% will be overheads and 1.5% profit. It might not sound much, but it's a substantial figure when you realise that the capital employed is a fraction of the overall cost. I've no reason to think that civils will enjoy higher OHP, but i could be wrong.

It's very hard to comment usefully without knowing the roundabout or the costs. i can't think for one minute that the money is being spent on anything other than the works, as public bodies are audited. So the only thing that i can think of is that the £5million relates to a wider scope of works i.e. other locations.

Can you provide a link to a webpage with the works mentioned? It may be possible for you to get a breakdown of the contractor costs under Freedom of Information, especially as it's public works. They will have had to fill in a Contract Sum Analysis or a rarity these days a Bill of Quantities. I'd be interested to see it too, for research.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 10:34
Where does the money go? - Hamsafar
I work in the public sector, and most of the costs go on 'back end' junkets, meetings, consultants, and general corruption.
For example toploading of the cost of work, in return for 'gifts', and even the three companies that work goes out to tender are all in it together with unofficial agreement of the begifted officials. This country is sooo corrupt, but they are the best at hiding it.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 11:58
Where does the money go? - Dipstick
Thanks to all. This is actually a very interesting subject to me, so I'm grateful for your input. To respond to some points:

Thanks HJ for the book title. I'll be interested to find a copy.

cjehuk - public awareness to me means some posters and a bit of media attention. There is no rerouting. Surveying of services to me means checking some plans, or at the outside, a man with a sophisticated metal detector looking for pipes for a day. Road markings is some paint. Light sequencing I appreciate is tricky, but five million would pay for a career, not one project. Not being difficult, just can't see how that all adds up to that much money.

As to the profit margins being small - thanks peterb - if as mare says it might only be 1.5% that's in the order of 75k profit on this project to the contractor. Interesting.

Fimally, mare again, thanks for those numbers. JCBs are cheaper than I thought they might be (enough money to employ one machine every day for five years then, to be facetious) and tarmac more expensive.

There's a news website about it at this link. Now, before I go any further, let me point out that web page is ambiguous. You could easily read it as saying the junction improvements PLUS the lights are five and a half million, which is a different scenario to the one I asked about. In fact the spokesman on the radio last week was clearly saying the lights are five million over and above the junction improvements. So I need to check that situation out, and my figures, before going much further. I'll do that, as the two things are very clearly different.

The web page is here:

tinyurl.com/jos2n



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Mon 27 Feb 2006 12:30
Where does the money go? - Stuartli
A NEW roundabout (without lights) would be £500-750k,>>


A straightforward roundabout (no lights) built about seven or eight years ago near where I live (it's about 30 yards across) cost £1m.

Around two years ago a new suspension bridge was built over an artificial lake (the work covered about 150 yards all in with road works) and cost what many felt was a very expensive £6m (a straightforward road bridge would have be quite sufficient).

Yet in relation to the roundabout mentioned, the £6m almost seems a bargain...:-)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 12:46
Where does the money go? - Dipstick
Maybe I've mentioned before that on the A14 near the Girton turnoff a layby was built a year or two ago. A layby. Six hundred and seventy five thousand pounds.

The joy is that when it was finished it was deemed unsafe to use, as there was no run off from it into the traffic. Too steep an angle back onto the dual carriageway. Suspiciously, it seems to have a lovely long shallow access INTO it. I've often wondered whether it was built back to front, actually.

So it was closed immediately. Never been used to this day. It bears a no entry sign.

I have no idea whether anyone lost their job, or whether tax payers received a refund from the contractors.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 13:04
Where does the money go? - KMO
Having just realised what you're talking about, just calling it a "roundabout" is rather misleading. I was envisaging some little pile of bricks that cars go around.

It's a major dual-carriageway junction - the same design as a typical motorway junction. Currently a 2-lane roundabout built above the dual carriageway, with 5 exits (2 onto the A14, 1 minor, and 2 major).

It's basically being expanded from 2 lanes to 3 - a pretty major piece of work, as it's all elevated. The A10 approach is also being dualled, and another separate feeder onto the A14 is being built. It's a very busy junction - one of the main commuter entry points into Cambridge - and the work is taking months, as it can't be closed. It started in August, and is still going.

I'm not an auditor, but my initial impression is that £5 million doesn't seem remotely unreasonable for something of this scale.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 13:33
Where does the money go? - Dipstick
All appreciated - but the gist of the thing, as I mentioned earlier, is that my understanding is that the five and a half million is just for the lights, over and above the other improvements. Certainly that's what was being reported on the media last week. As I also mentioend, I'm going to try and clarify that in case I'm wrong.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 13:55
Where does the money go? - Hamsafar
"Neuro Diversity and Conflict Management Seminar"

this is the latest moneypit.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 15:06
Where does the money go? - Dalglish
It's no use asking the council. They just say "contractor's
costs" or some such and you have no more idea.

>>

you have a right to get the fullest reply from your council:

www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/council/foi/

"Cambridgeshire County Council already makes a large amount of information available to its citizens in an open and friendly way. Information can be obtained through its website, leaflets and many other publications. The Council wants Cambridgeshire's residents to have access to all the information they need in order that they can become involved in the Council's work.
Under the new Freedom of Information Act, .... "
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 14:22
Where does the money go? - artful dodger {P}
About 20 years ago when the M20 was linked to the south side of the M25 via the M26, there was no access from the east from Sevenoaks. This was done to save £110,000. It would probably cost £10-15 million to add it now. For anyone living in Sevenoaks and wanting to join the motorway going east involves a 10 mile route by to A25 through many other villages, despite the motorway running cloes to the town centre.

When motorways were first built, the hardshoulders were intended for occassional use and built accordingly. When the motorways needed resurfacing after about 20 years, the traffic volume was now so great that the hardshoulders had to be rebuilt to allow their use as a carriageway.

When the Medway Tunnel was connected to a new road accessing a large industrial estate, no allowance had been made for the roundabout in the original plans for the estate. The comment made was that the final position had not yet been agreed at a public enquiry. This public enquiry, at a huge cost, delayed the whole project by about 8 years and hence cost even more than initially planned.


--
Roger
I read frequently, but only post when I have something useful to say.
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Mon 27 Feb 2006 16:34
Where does the money go? - BobbyG
I remember a couple of years ago there were major roadworks on M8 at Junction 6 Newhouse. Loads of publicity in newspaper and local radio about the selays, all the trafic would be channelled along the hard shoulder.

Exactly 2 hours after the diversion started, it was stopped as the hard shoulder collapsed with the weight of all the traffic! No one had bothered to check that it could carry the traffic!

On a similar note, on the opposite side of the carriageway, they have been trialling these flashing red cats eyes things. There is a sign up announcing the trial with the year (2004) beside it. The lights seem to flash at random but there are no signs up saying what the flashing lights mean! No idea how much that lot cost!
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 19:45
Where does the money go? - Sofa Spud
My theory is about the disappearing millions of public money is that it goes out to private consultancy firms. It seems that vast amounts of public money get spent on paying outside organisations to evaluate situations and advise on decisions that professional council staff are qualified, trained and employed to handle.

Not a few of these consultants were themselves formerly high-flying local authority professionals who, having risen near to the top of the ladder by their mid to late 30's, made the seamless leap into the lucrative 'local government support' sector.
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 19:49
Where does the money go? - Honestjohn
Of course it does. How do you think civil servants, local government officials and councillors supplement their meagre official incomes.

HJ
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 20:01
Where does the money go? - Aprilia
Of course it does. How do you think civil servants, local
government officials and councillors supplement their meagre official incomes.
HJ


Another shot at anyone in the public sector. Gets a bit boring after a while.
I think councillors get expenses only, don't they? (apart from huge bribes from construction industry...).
If these jobs are so good then how come we don't all want one? Mate of mine is a (private sector) accountant and reckons there are something like 5000+ accountancy jobs vacant across the public sector but they can't fill them because pay and perks are poor. Another thing I heard is that much local authority planning (building and highways) is now done by freelancers because local authorities no longer want to take them on as employees - they just bring them in as and when needed.
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 20:09
Where does the money go? - Honestjohn
Who was it wrote "Britain is the most corrupt country in the World, and the one that hides it best." Of course, most civil servants, local government officials and councillors are honest people. But those with million pound houses, children in £2,000 a term private schools and extensive untraceable overseas investments possibly aren't. And who is going to investigate them apart from others in the same game? However I will agree with anyone who says that starting from massive overspending on public works road projects this is going way off topic.

HJ
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 20:36
Where does the money go? - Aprilia
But those with million pound houses, children in £2,000 a term
private schools and extensive untraceable overseas investments possibly aren't. And who
is going to investigate them apart from others in the same
game?


Fraud squad? NCS? NAO?

I must admit I don't know that many people with influential jobs in the public sector.
My experience of the (private) property and construction business is that there is much corruption. Indeed the chair of governors at my youngest child's school is a chartered surveyor and director of a building firm. He didn't turn up to a meeting and we found he's been arrested in connection with a fraud. I also know a local estate agent (a member of our church) and he's so dodgy I'm surprised there isn't a clap of thunder and bolt of lightening when he enters on a Sunday!
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 21:57
Where does the money go? - NowWheels
Who was it wrote "Britain is the most corrupt country in
the World, and the one that hides it best."


I've no idea who, but I am pretty sure that it was someone who didn't have much experience of other countries. Italy, anyone? :(
Of course,
most civil servants, local government officials and councillors are honest people.
But those with million pound houses, children in £2,000 a term
private schools and extensive untraceable overseas investments possibly aren't.


How many of those are there? And how many of them are unable to account for their wealth through inheritance, careful investments etc?

Take a mid-senior ranking Whitehall civil servant I know. Dresses in nice Italian designer clothes, and spends as much time as possible at a place in Italy. Sounds fishy, until you realise that the spouse is Italian, the place out there shared with relatives, and accessible 'cos they live beside an airport frequented by the cheap airlines.
And who is going to investigate them apart from others in the same
game?


The Audit Commission, for starters: www.audit-commission.gov.uk

I know plenty of people who work in the public sector and plenty in private enterprises. There is a heck of a lot less payola in the public sector.
However I will agree with anyone who says that starting
from massive overspending on public works road projects this is going
way off topic.


Having had a father who worked half his career in local govt, and known a lot of his colleagues, I share Aprilia's dislike for public-sector-bashing. I suspect that people who don't know that territory well may not see how many staff there really are dedicated public servants.

However, returning on topic, I do suspect that the public sector may be prone to two problems: specification creep, and insufficiently rigorous purchasing policies. No instant solution to either, but I think it's important to remember that there is a world of a difference between a corrupt relationship with conractors and one where public authorities don't manage the bidding process as rigorously as might be possible. Maybe times have changed, but it used to alarm me how much of the de facto power in spending decisions was made either by people with predominantly administrative training, or by those with technical training. The public sector is often over-administered and under-managed :(

In that culture, there can easily end up being too much emphasis on process rather than outcomes, and I'm not sure that competitive tendering has improved the situation much -- just relocated the problems :(

The really interesting thing for a job like the expensive traffic lights would be for someone to do what Compaq did in the early 90s: to set up a separate unit to rethink some of the processes from the ground up. I don't follow public administration enough to know how much (if at all) that is being done.
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Wed 1 Mar 2006 22:04
Where does the money go? - Honestjohn
NowWheels has just proved my point. But it has got off motoring. We'd really better get back to why minor roadworks take 6 months to accomplish and cost millions of quid.

HJ
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Mon 6 Mar 2006 09:45
Where does the money go? - Hamsafar
Where does all the money go?...


Leeds is one of the few large cities in Europe not to have trams
An investigation is being launched by the National Audit Office into the failed Leeds Supertram bid.

Almost £40m was spent on the plans before they were rejected by the Department of Transport in November.

The investigation will look at whether public money was spent appropriately by the department.

Transport Secretary Alistair Darling turned down the Supertram plans on the basis that the likely cost of £500m did not represent value for money.

Instead, he said Leeds should spend money on more frequent bus services using new vehicles.

Leeds North West MP Greg Mulholland told BBC News he had been told of the Audit Office's decision to launch the investigation and welcomed it.
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Mon 6 Mar 2006 11:48
Where does the money go? - daveyjp
The Leeds Supertram Act was passed in 1993 - this was an act allowing Leeds to use CPOs where necessary to acquire land along the routes. I suspect a large amount of the £40m will have been spent on land and property which are now part of Leeds Council's asset register and can be sold if required.

BTW Alastair Darling has agreed to a tram system in Edinburgh where the price per km of track is much higher than Leeds - remind me where Mr Darling's constituency is again?
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Mon 6 Mar 2006 16:23
Where does the money go? - Dipstick
As I started this topic, and thus have brought Cambridgeshire to the very forefront of the backroom consciousness, you may be interested to know we are privileged enough here to be the rather unwilling recipients of what has been described as one of the largest white elephant transport schemes ever to be foisted upon the public.

There is a disused railway running between St Ives and Cambridge. Plans have now been mooted, agreed and funded (66 million) to rip up the rails, replace them with concrete and introduce one of the world's very few guided bus schemes, one being in Essen, Germany, as well as one in Leeds. A public enquiry has been held.

There are so many arguments against this idea that my blood pressure is done no favours by thinking about it; I won't enumerate them all. But the two chief issues that I think many of us have are:

The buses will carry so little passenger traffic it will make virtually no difference to the A14 traffic, which is THE big problem for Cambridge. Indeed, the official figures seem to be that they "hope" it will cut A14 traffic by 2% by 2016. For sixty six million pounds it seems to me that we could offer an awful lot of free bus passes for the existing bus network, thus getting people onto the much loved public transport system for ..well..nothing, effectively.

The buses will leave the guided tracks in Cambridge, where absolutely no extra provision in terms of bus lanes or other measures are being put into place over and above what is there now (it's not at all comprehensive or joined up). They will simply sit in the traffic as buses do now.

If can imagine no less effective transport scheme, other than the public provision of roller skates and small chihuahuas to pull one along.

The pro argument is here. The con arguments are everywhere else on the web.

tinyurl.com/e6ms2
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Mon 6 Mar 2006 18:34
Where does the money go? - J Bonington Jagworth
"guided bus"

In other words, a train!

Reminds of the Simpsons episode about the monorail, which was also an expensive lemon, even before Homer got to drive it...
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Mon 6 Mar 2006 18:42
Where does the money go? - J Bonington Jagworth
"They will simply sit in the traffic as buses do now."

Indeed, but the difference is that new scheme will keep a whole tier of bureaucracy afloat for a few more years and keep people who would otherwise be unemployable off the register.

This is also the answer to your original query - we don't manufacture anything any more, but work has to be found for everyone, even (especially!) those whom the education system has signally failed to prepare for anything useful.

Whether he likes it or not, Blair will be judged a long time before he meets his maker...
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Fri 10 Mar 2006 19:18
Where does the money go? - dieselhead
Not just a matter of keeping them off the register. The figures are probably fiddled anyway.
Over the last few years there has been a massive expansion of non jobs in the public sector whilst manufacturing jobs are disapearing along with the skills. Blair doesn't care about this as it gets more people on side by forcing them to be dependant on welfare or doing non productive government jobs.

Doesnt matter if it's suspiciously expensive traffic light schemes or corrupt government ministers it's indicative of the way Britain is emerging as a centrally controlled socialist state with Tony telling us how to spend our money, what to think and how to bring up kids.

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Fri 10 Mar 2006 19:57
Where does the money go? - morebeerplease
re "I genuinely wonder if anyone knows where the bulk of money goes on roadworks projects?"

put a freedom of information act request into the council, and force them to give you a break down of the costs

easily done

if they dont comply make sure you take it to the information commissioner

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