Claims that a Channel fixed link will, when open, benefit the local economy do not stand up to objective scrutiny, according to Kent’s chief strategic planner, Martin Simmons.(*) Considerable job losses will occur in east Kent, Mr Simmons says, and a drive-across scheme in particular will put what is an economically stagnant area into considerable decline. “Drive-across schemes would be particularly harmful because of the fundamental law of economic geography they invoke: the free-flow transport facility they create would make economic activity less, not more, likely to locate near the crossing. In such circumstances, industry and commerce would prefer to locate nearer the main markets or sources of production. Far from encouraging new activities to east Kent, a drift away of the limited amount of new development is likely to be induced in the area as a result of a threefold increase in traffic since accession to the EEC.
“Transport-orientated business will be particularly affected. Moreover, it is doubtful whether the labour-intensive ferry services can co-exist with the massive increase in capacity created by drive-across links.”
Unemployment in Kent is currently 14%, compared with the regional average of 9.5%. The rate of 1971-81 employment growth was very small compared with areas west of London, while take-up rates for new development and rental levels are the lowest in the region. But for the growth of employment at the Kent ports, which has more than doubled to a present figure of about 12,000, the figures would have been much worse. However, reversal of this one bright spot, alongside coalfield closures and a leisure and tourism sector which is in decline (contrary to the national trend), will make east Kent a blackspot of national significance. “In this situation we are being offered a capital-intensive means of crossing the Channel.”
The present methods of crossing the Channel, Mr Simmons points out, are employment-intensive. Without a fixed link it is estimated that there will be 18,000 jobs handling cross-Channel traffic in Kent at the end of the century. Kent County Council is challenging the promoters’ claims of no job loss, based on the prospects of employment in operating its links and the market share left to the ferries. The county council estimates that there will be an overall net job loss of 5,000 to 9,000, depending on the type of scheme, and the prospects for attracting new development are critical.
It is the French side that stands to gain most from the Channel link, Mr Simmons argues, particularly as the present British ferry dominance will disappear. To stand a chance of competing with the French side, a new purpose-designed development organisation with executive powers and finance, capable of mounting a comprehensive assistance package, is seen as vital.
A fixed link is not in the local interest, Mr Simmons concludes, although this “will not be an easy argument to sustain, viewed from Britain’s hard-hit regions. The huge public-backed development effort which will be mounted on the French side, and its threat not only to east Kent’s recovery but also to the region’s future growth, must be borne in mind.
“Given an appropriate package, and the choice of the CTG rail tunnel scheme with its lesser impact on the local economy and greater prospects for induced development, a fixed link can be faced with some hope. Drive-across schemes would be more disastrous, and at least let us be spared the abomination of bridges from France or grotesque artificial islands hitting our glorious heritage of white cliffs.”
(*) In The Planner, journal of the Royal Town Planning Institute, January 1986.
