Why the UK needs more trams and how to make more of them

“People like trams” says former Campaign for Better Transport Director Norman Baker. So why are there so few light rail systems in Britain, and what is the path to building more? Richard Foster reports.

In this article:

• Light Rail Challenges in Britain: Britain's tram development lags behind due to high costs, bureaucratic hurdles, and limited government support compared to other nations.
• Economic and Urban Benefits: Trams support housing density, reduce car reliance, increase property values, and rejuvenate urban spaces, as seen in Bordeaux.
• Proposed Reforms: Solutions include utility management reforms, tax levies, shallow trackbeds, and centralizing expertise to streamline tramway construction.

It’s probably fair to say that we Brits don’t like admitting that other countries do things better than us.

But it’s a bitter pill that we have to swallow when it comes to light rail. The French, the Germans, even the Americans, do light rail better than we do.

China, for example, opened 218 miles of new light rail in 14 cities between November 28 2023 and December 30 2023.

By comparison, Britain’s newest piece of tramway is just 600 metres long. The Blackpool Tramway’s Talbot Road branch, which officially opened on June 12 2024, cost £22 million to build.

Why does Britain lag behind in light rail (most specifically tramway) construction?

Campaign group Britain Remade joined forces with urban planning specialist Create Streets, and with help from Campaign for Better Transport (CBT) produced Back on Track. This report highlights why we find it difficult to build trams - and (more importantly) offers solutions to overcome these issues.

Former CBT Director Norman Baker was complementary about the result: “The report… is eminently sensible, especially in lowering hurdles to jump [over]. People like trams. They can secure modal shift from cars more effectively than buses.”

The catalyst for the report was the discovery by Create Streets that trams could help it to deliver its visionary concept of ‘gentle density’.

Create Streets Managing Director David Milner explains: “It’s really not about height. It’s about terraces, it’s about mansion blocks, it’s about slightly tighter distances between the homes. It’s about looking to the historic street patterns and seeing how we can replicate them.”

Create Streets’ mission is to solve the UK’s housing crisis. By bringing houses slightly closure together (like a row of Victorian terraces), and by reducing parking and the space for roads, ‘gentle density’ allows more houses to be built in smaller spaces.

To put that into context, if the authorities in the Wiltshire town of Chippenham adopted ‘gentle density’, they would be able to build the 7,500 new homes that they’re planning in 40% less space than currently earmarked.

If that approach is applied to the 1.5 million new homes that the new Labour government promises, Create Streets estimates that it could save an area of countryside the size of the Isle of Wight from being built on.

But ‘gentle density’ requires reliable public transport.

Heavy rail, says Milner, is “effective at what it does, but it’s quite expensive and it’s quite hard to bring new heavy rail in for new housing developments”.

The other traditional alternative is the bus. But then Milner discovered a third option… trams.

“I was on a call with Stuttgart’s chief planner, and he very casually talks about how they build the tram line out to the [development] plot, and you have a tram and no homes. He said: ‘Here are the different areas and they’re all going to different developers.’

“Developers know what they can build, they know trams are going to be there from Day 1, and that way they can dial the parking numbers down. And the people buying the homes know that they can get to work in 25 minutes.

“You show me a masterplan in the UK where that can happen. Occasionally, we’ll build around a station or upgraded capacity.

“Light rail is a really effective but different tool kit… that should absolutely be exploited to deliver more homes. But also, to create the local economic conglomeration and the local economic growth effects. That’s why we’ve had this mantra - ‘it’s time for trams’.”

So, what is actually stopping new tram development in the UK?

Take an average, metalled city street. Road signs, street lights, and other infrastructure is already in place. You don’t need to spend anything on that street to start running buses on it, except the cost of the bus… and maybe installing a bus stop.

Put trams down that street, and it’s a completely different matter.

Martin Fleetwood, consultant for law firm Addleshaw Goddard, and who has decades of light rail experience under his belt, explains: “The big costs for light rail are putting the rails in the roadway and moving utilities. And then it’s the trams themselves and the other infrastructure - the control centre, depot, platforms, ticket machines, and all that sort of stuff.”

Given that all cities and municipalities face these costs, why are some countries more proactive than others on tramway construction?

Transport schemes in the UK are ultimately funded by national government. There are various hoops that schemes have to jump through before they’re approved.

One of these is the Transport Analysis Guidance model - now called WebTAG. Tramways don’t always fare well here.

Fleetwood explains: “The biggest issue with WebTAG is that it’s an economic appraisal. It doesn’t look at the residual economic benefits. It doesn’t look at the environmental benefits.”

Bordeaux is a good example of how a tramway can transform an urban space. The city in France’s South West was often called La Belle Endormie (‘The Sleeping Beauty’), with its beautiful and historic architecture described on one travel website as “derelict, dark and lacking in dynamism”.

It was mayor Alain Juppé who kick-started plans for a tramway to help free up its transport network.

The tramway was not an easy sell to Bordeaux’s inhabitants, but construction started in 2000. The first section of Line A opened in 2003, followed by Lines B and C in 2004. Since then, the system has grown into a 48-mile network.

But what of the transformations the tramway has brought?

A 1990s photograph of the space that separates the Place de la Bourse from the river Garonne shows a sea of cars. Cars driving, cars parked, minimal pedestrian spaces.

Today, there are huge green spaces and wide pedestrian promenades - perfect for leisure activities.

“The transformational effects of light rail are not taken into account in the appraisal, in the way that they should be,” says Fleetwood.

“There are complaints as to how expensive per kilometre tram track it is, but we are enhancing the city or the town in which the tram is operating.

The permanence of a nearby tram system will attract people to the area. The same cannot be said for a bus route, which in the UK could be cancelled or amended at comparatively short notice.

This is reflected in research carried out by Lloyds Bank, which showed a rise in property prices in Birmingham, Edinburgh, Manchester and Nottingham (an average of 12%) where properties are close to tram stops.

“We should be shouting really loudly about how trams can solve your city’s economic and health problems,” says Milner.

“For me, transport/housing - it’s two sides of the same coin. We are the same people, whether we like it or not.”

Fleetwood adds: “There’s the phrase ‘an Englishman’s home is his castle’, and that’s because the UK has quite strong rights to protect property from encroachment. Other parts of Europe take the view that the state should have priority, that the movement of the masses should have priority.

“Over the years, there have been many tram schemes that have not continued because there have been too many objections.

“Edinburgh is a case in point, because it took so long and cost a lot more than anyone was expecting. People were going: ‘Never ever will we have a new tram system, do not even speak of it.’

“Now, we have the extension to Leith, there’s going to be a north-south line, and people are saying: ‘When’s the next one?’”

Moving utilities from under the route is a time-consuming part of construction. They could be left in situ but, as Fleetwood explains, UK tram operators have no control over when the utility company wants to carry out maintenance.

“If there’s a gas leak, they want to come in and dig up that section of roadway. If your only route is down that road, you’ve had your system cut in half,” he says.

Back on Track offers pragmatic solutions to all these issues. The biggest challenge is to get the cost per kilometre in the UK (currently some £87m) to a parity with Europe (approximately £42m).

The path to reform, naturally, starts with the government. Updating the Code of Practice would, says the report, “give clear rules on which utilities to move, reducing the cost and time of negotiation with utility companies”.

Effectively, it adds, only “iron Victorian pipes should be replaced”, while “modern plastic water pipes, telecoms and electrics should, by default, not be moved”.

Tram timetabling, the report says, should factor in the disruption caused when access to the utility is needed, suggesting: “Tram services should terminate at the two stops nearest the disruption, enabling a quick walk between them.”

The report does suggest that utility companies should bear more of the financial burden for moving utilities (Norman Baker described the work carried out in Edinburgh as “free upgrades to their network”).

Transport consultant Stephen Joseph agrees with the principle, but says: “There will be an argument now that in a world in which you want the utilities, particularly the energy ones, to also pay for a move to net zero, and the water industry is financially struggling, that loading extra costs onto them isn’t the way to do it.

“I think the answer is that we’re not really loading extra costs onto them, because what they’re doing is gold plating. Actually, some of this stuff is completely unnecessary. A different approach won’t disadvantage them.

“There are answers to this, but there are going to be lobbyists against some of this stuff.”

Another way to reduce the impact on utility companies is to simply not dig down as far. Most UK tram systems have a concrete track bed of between 500mm and 1,000mm deep. By contrast, says the report, the tram system in Portland (in the US state of Oregon) is only 305mm deep.

“Everybody believes that there’s a requirement to build tram lines that can take 48-tonne lorries,” says Joseph.

“David Milner says that he’s not been able to nail this down. But lots of people told him this, so it becomes a thing.”

Even if that’s true, there is technology available that can withstand heavy lorries and only requires a shallow bed to be dug.

Coventry City Council Director of Innovation Colin Knight told delegates at July’s UK Light Rail Conference in Leeds about the properties of Ultra High-Performance Reinforced Concrete.

“It’s an amazing material. It was first developed overseas in 1979, but it’s been little used in the UK. Looking at how it performs, it’s brilliant,” he said.

This innovative concrete forms the backbone of the shallow-bed track that’s at the heart of the proposed Coventry Very Light Rail system. Testing of both track and car is under way at the Very Light Rail National Innovation Centre near Dudley.

Knight continues: “The analysis suggests that the slabs can take an infinite number of loadings and they’re not going to start cracking or deteriorating.”

The ‘material limit’ on a trial section currently in use at a depot is nine megapascal, but the most it has ever carried is 4Mpa.

Knight adds: “So far, the test track has been in there for 18 months and we’ve had over a million tonnes of stuff pass over it.”

The Back on Track report says: “Future British tram projects should study and implement cheaper, shallower trackbeds.”

However, as 2024 rolls into 2025, Coventry VLR is still waiting on government funding before that can be put into action.

What’s happening (or rather not happening) in Coventry highlights another key issue. Devolution has given metro mayors, via the City Region Sustainable Transport Settlements, the ability to fund local transport projects.

Fleetwood explains that throughout much of Europe, public transport is intrinsically linked to local authorities that have much stronger powers. A French mayor, for example, has local tax raising powers. Something similar takes place in Germany.

“You have the Länder, the states, which have certain tax raising powers and fundraising powers in a greater way than local authorities in the UK, so again, they find it easier to put into place these integrated transport systems.”

Back on Track lists several initiatives from home and abroad that have helped raise money for light rail.

In France, Versement Transport is effectively a levy on an employer’s National Insurance contributions.

Even a 1p levy in somewhere such as Leeds could generate £70m of funds. Couple that with a Workplace Parking Levy (Nottingham’s raises £9m per annum), and that’s a decent chunk of money to put towards a tram system.

The report adds: “Central government should enable councils who are planning a tram project to collect stamp duty uplift for houses on sale nearby the tram lines, as well as targeted council tax precepts, subject to a referendum.

“Councils should use the ability to engage in Tax Increment Financing to borrow against future revenues from the uplift in business rates.”

It also suggests that the government should develop a grant system akin to the RAISE-BUILD-TIGER grants available from the US Department of Transportation. Billions of dollars have been invested in “road, rail, transit and port projects that promise to achieve national objectives”.

One of the biggest issues surrounding light rail construction in the UK is that we don’t do it often enough, and that systems are developed in isolation.

Back on Track recommends that the Department for Transport create a “specialist delivery unit” for light rail.

This would work with industry bodies (the Light Rail Safety and Standards Board and UKTram, to name but two) to develop common standards across the industry and to aid ‘bulk buying’ of new vehicles, with the associated cost savings.

To make that work, “the government needs to… encourage a pipeline of projects”. The report also recommends taking the Transport & Works Act Order approval away from the Transport Secretary and giving it to regional mayors.

“I think we have killer policy changes that do not need primary legislation,” says Milner. They could, he adds, be “changed this parliament”.

Says Joseph: “People who lobby for trams love trams. Trams and light rail need their enthusiasts, but they tend to take it as read that trams are a great thing. Why Back on Track is important is that it’s coming from an urban design perspective. It’s a land-use planning and transport solution in which trams are central.

“There will always be what might be called the ‘Alistair Darling argument’, which is that buses can do it a lot better and cheaper.

“With the best will in the world, reserved fixed-track public transport systems seem to do better and have more attraction for people to use them than buses do. Only trams have the carrying capacity. You can’t run buses at the same density.

“[Minister for the Future of Roads] Lilian Greenwood gave a speech about vision-led transport planning and about moving from thinking about transport to thinking about places. That’s why this why this stuff might actually have a chance of getting somewhere.”