Introduction

Framework for transport research

Research in transport covers a wide field, embracing the mainbranches of engineering, economics, statistics and others of thesocial sciences. A substantial proportion of the UK nationalresearch effort in transport is funded by government either directlyor indirectly, although the transport industries themselves alsoplay a significant role. The principal channel for direct support bygovernment used to be the Transport Research Laboratory (TRL), whichwas formerly part of the Department of Transport (DoT) and wasprivatised in 1996. The majority of TRL's work continues to befunded on a contract basis by government, but the Department (nowthe Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions) makesuse of a much wider range of external contractors in fulfilling itsresearch agenda: there is no longer any presumption in favour ofTRL. Indirect support from government is primarily channelledthrough the funding arrangements for universities and researchcouncils.

Despite the substantial volume of transport research in total terms,very little of this has been directed towards collecting andevaluating evidence to inform policy or towards assessing theeffectiveness of policy in action. This chapter seeks to probe thequestion of why this has been so, particularly in the case ofresearch funded directly by government, and what the consequenceshave been. Within the transport industries themselves,policy-relevant research and development, as might be expected, hasbeen primarily driven by considerations of the market and orientatedtowards the improvement of safety, speed and technical efficiency –often involving an increasing level of automation. If anything, thisis more true in the post-privatisation era than in the days whenmajor transport undertakings such as British Rail and BritishAirways were nationalised. In the case of research supported throughuniversities and research councils, little of such work is, nor isintended to be, relevant to policy. There is no barrier to relevancein principle, it is simply that the incentives in the universitysystem have been largely directed more towards the advancement ofacademic disciplines and the pursuit of more fundamental scientificenquiry.