ABSTRACT
The role played by public transport in Britain has changed considerably in recent decades, from a semi-monopoly in the late 1940s – under somewhat artificial conditions – to a small share of the national market in the 1990s. In the case of bus travel, this has been associated with an absolute decline in the volume of travel; for rail an approximately stable absolute volume, growing in the late 1990s, but a fall as a percentage of a growing total market. The overall share of motorized domestic passenger-kilometres (km) taken by public transport – 13 per cent in 19991 – is fairly typical of Western Europe, but the absolute decline is highly untypical. In most other European countries the volume of passenger-km on local public transport, as well as rail, has often remained roughly stable, or increased, despite similar or higher levels of car ownership.
