ABSTRACT
A main aim of this book is to explain the configuration and trajectory of transport policy into the twenty-first century. To meet this aim, transport policy change in localities and at national government level in the UK is examined with particular emphasis placed on the role of a groundswell of environmental pressure in influencing policy change. A key point of exploration is critically to assess the claim that a major shift occurred in transport policy-making in the 1990s (Marvin and Guy, 1999; Masser et al., 1992; Owens, 1995). In many ways the ‘new’ environmental argumentation that emerged in the last quarter of the twentieth century was incompatible with the ‘predict and provide’ paradigm. Some form of shift must, therefore, occur if such argumentation is to be incorporated into transport policy. Ascertaining the extent of any change can be undertaken in a number of ways. This Chapter proposes a conceptual framework derived principally from sociological institutionalism.
