Happy motoring
Sir: Like Gavin Stamp (Not motoring, 16 March), I am very much in favour of main- taining the Forth Bridge in good order. There is, however, a subtext in his article to the effect that this is all part of a deliberate neglect of the rail system in favour of roads, and that if we had better trains we would all leave our cars at home, etc. I do not think he should be allowed to get away with this as easily as that.
I visited Holland last week. On successive days in the early afternoon, I travelled between The Hague and Rotterdam, by train on Tuesday and by car on Wednesday. The train, like most Dutch trains, was clean, silent, punctual, affordable, fast and more than half empty. The motorway was crowded in one direction and stationary in the other, due to the mother of all traffic jams.
I mention this only as evidence that, even given the option of a rail system so good that it must appeal to right-on thinkers like Gavin Stamp, and notwithstanding the dubious charms of the Rotterdam motor- way, the ecologically-minded Dutch still use their cars in large numbers. I do not wish to deduce a heavy moral from this observa- tion; except perhaps that Edinburgh's con- gestion seems unlikely to diminish, for rea- sons more related to the romanticism of motoring than to the more puritanical appeal of not motoring. Or, in other words, it will take a whole lot more than painting the Forth Bridge to get the Scots out of their cars. I have to declare an interest: I am a retired oil company executive.
Peter Kassler
Manorwood, Cranleigh Road, Wonersh, Surrey
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