A Highland councillor has branded as ‘urban hogwash’ a call to government by walking and cycling organisations to end road building and prioritise green travel instead.
Caol and Mallaig councillor Allan Henderson was responding to a joint submission by eight active travel groups to a public consultation on the new National Transport Strategy.
Cycling Scotland, Cycling UK, Forth Environment Link, Living Streets, Paths for All, Ramblers Scotland, Sustrans Scotland and Transform Scotland have submitted joint responses to the consultation, which closed yesterday.
They are calling for an end to road building and diverting those resources into prioritising active travel and delivering affordable public transport.
Mr Henderson, who chairs both transport partnership HiTrans and Highland Council’s environment, development and infrastructure committee said: “It’s disgraceful that central belt based organisations should be advocating no extensions of the roads network.
“Are they not already aware of the difficulties and dangers of badly engineered roads faced by Highland drivers every day, roads that were built for horse and cart?
“These highly government-funded organisations should be looking at upgrades of trunk roads to proper standards with active travel built in.
“This stinks of urban hogwash and idealistic nonsense.
“The problem is, they are the government-funded charities and they are listened to.
“If these think-tanks tell government it could save billions of pounds, they may not act fully on it, but they could stall for a year or two.”