First published 2000 by Ashgate Publishing
Reissued 2018 by Routledge
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Copyright Graham West 2000
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A Library of Congress record exists under LC control number:
ISBN 13: 978-1-138-74323-6 (hbk)
ISBN 13: 978-1-138-74321-2 (pbk)
ISBN 13: 978-1-315-18187-5 (ebk)
: British Standards Institution.
: Transport Research Laboratory.
: The Observer.
: adapted from C.A. OFlaherty, Highways.
: adapted from H. Law and D.K. Clark, The Construction of Roads and Streets.
: W. Taylor, The Military Roads in Scotland.
: The Oxford Illustrated History of Britain.
: Autocar.
: adapted from Highways and Transportation.
: Collins.
: adapted from G.D. Matheson, Aspects of Highway Rock Engineering in the UK, Geological Society.
: Atlas de la Revolution Frangais, Editions EHESS, Paris.
: British Cement Association.
: Sustainability Counts, Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions.
: Britain 1998. HM Stationery Office.
The road is one of the earliest artefacts; moreover it is one that has remained useful to man over almost the whole span of history, although, as we shall see, the road has been more highly prized at some times than at others. As the great Victorian historian Macaulay remarked in his famous aphorism, the road, because it abridges distance, is one of the three great agents of civilisation (the other two, he said, were the alphabet and the printing press). The purpose of this book is to describe and discuss the development of roads in Great Britain with special emphasis on the technical aspects of their construction and use. There are two reasons for this: firstly, the fact that the technical history of roads is interesting in its own right, and secondly, that it is only by considering these technical considerations along with political, social, military and economic matters that we can properly understand the role that the road has played in the history of our country. This is to assert, of course, that technical history becomes much more meaningful if it is integrated with the history of the country as a whole, and vice versa.
The author has spent his professional life on the staff of the Transport Research Laboratory, and when embarking on a career of road research in the mid-1950s, an important consideration in this decision was the widely held belief that roads were an unalloyed benefit to mankind. Today no-one could have this simple assurance. The rise of motorway objection groups, and protesters against plans for bypasses and other road improvements, show that the advantage to the many can sometimes only be bought at the expense of a disadvantage to the few. And roads themselves, these days, with their problems of traffic congestion, noise and pollution, and their toll of accidents are now viewed as a mixed blessing.
The three elements of historical writing are description, narrative and analysis. The first two are mainly matters of fact but the third is essentially based on an interpretation of the facts by the historian. In this book the description and narrative follow those of the established authorities on the various aspects of the technical history of roads. However, the interpretation and analysis of these factual matters is primarily that of the author. The subject matter has been collected from a wide range of sources, the more important of which are listed in the Bibliography, and to which grateful acknowledgement is made.
The book explores the technical history of roads in Great Britain primarily by means of an examination of the development of the construction of the road pavement, by which is meant the structure of the road, and which is probably its most important characteristic. The matters of geotechnics, embankments, cuttings, retaining walls, bridges and tunnels, and other aspects of modern road construction such as alignment, skidding resistance, riding quality, traffic planning and road layout are not dealt with, not because they are not important, but in order to confine the scope of the book to a manageable size. The study of the need for roads and the consequent development of the road network in Great Britain is a secondary theme of the book. Although the work is concerned with British roads, some descriptions of roads in other parts of Europe are made from time to time where these shed light on developments in Great Britain.
Following an introductory chapter which deals with such matters as terminology and units, and introduces some concepts necessary for an understanding of the rest of the book, bring us into the twentieth century, the former chapter dealing with the coming of the motor car and the bituminously surfaced road, and the latter chapter with the building of motorways. The final chapter of the book draws some general conclusions from the work and makes some pertinent observations. Four Appendices provide further information on rocks, soils, bituminous and concrete materials, and skidding resistance.
The book has been written to be intelligible to the layman, and it has, therefore, been necessary to simplify some technical descriptions and to offer much simplified presentations of what are sometimes complex matters for example, pavement design, traffic loading and slope stability. However, it is hoped that any highway engineer reading the book will not find the treatment is simplistic. Also, it should be pointed out that the figures used to illustrate the work are, for the most part, diagrammatic and intended mainly to help an understanding of the text. Where they have been borrowed, or adapted, from elsewhere this is gratefully acknowledged at the front of the book.
By a happy coincidence, the history of paved roads in Great Britain approximately corresponds with the Christian calendar, so that the celebration of the start of the third millennium of the one is also the celebration of the start of the third millennium of the other. The publication of this book is, therefore, timely.
The book shows that roads have been a main part of our built environment for some 2,000 years, and are now an essential element of the countrys infrastructure. It is the authors belief that the technical history of roads is as much worthy of study as the history of other more impressive branches of civil engineering such as bridges, dams, harbour works, railways and tunnels, particularly if studied in a broad context. If this book has gone some way to introduce roads and the achievements of roadmakers down through the ages to a wider public, it will have achieved one of its objectives.
