Question: The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council recently hosted a conference dealing with the role of research and the development of a more efficient transport system. What conclusions were drawn?

Peter Hedges: Well it's early days yet because we are still collating all the feedback we received on questionnaires at the end of the event. Certainly one of our intentions is not to rush to conclusions until we have studied the opinions of attendees.

The event had a number of objectives, the most important one was to showcase research to a wide range of potential users of that research. The attendees were precisely the sort of people we wanted to attract to the event such as transport professionals, politicians and user groups.

Question: What sort of subjects were covered?

Peter Hedges: The event actually highlighted a wide range of transport research that we and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Department for Transport have funded over the past few years.

The subjects covered ranged from topics like hard manufacturing research, transport technology, to urban planning and social policy. So we covered a large spectrum.

We were focusing on transport choice - research that is dealing with the traveller being able to access the widest range of possible transport options that are available.

Question: Transport select committee chairman Gwyneth Dunwoody spoke at the event. What were her main points?

Peter Hedges: Well the event was split into two sessions. The morning event was looking at the showcase activities, with five break out sessions all having one theme each. These included adapting to environmental requirements, responding to changes in social patterns and behaviour - which was all about how people interact with transport systems and how their actions affect the design of town centres - using technologies and successful transport planning.

The panel discussion was held at lunchtime and the subject of this was 'How do we solve transport congestion?'

So Gwyneth, along with the other panel members, was putting forward her own views on the various questions which came from the floor. It's difficult to summarise all of the things that she talked about because so many points were raised, but issues that came up included government policy and objectives, the ten year transport plan and so on and how that will affect congestion.

One of the things that was clear from the discussion is that although the government is now investing a lot of money into the transport system there is concern that it won't be enough? Issues like congestion charging and how effective it will be were also raised.

Question: Do you think that congestion charging will roll out to other towns and cities in the UK?

Peter Hedges: Well I think that it's difficult for me or EPSRC as a whole to have a position on that. Our view is that we support research looking into systems you can use to implement congestion charging and how those systems would work alongside a traffic management strategy.

There were a range of views expressed by the panel. Certainly some of the academics present were of the view that congestion charging is an essential mechanism that must be used and must be rolled out much more extensively than is currently planned.

On the other hand, Steven Norris, who was also one of the panel members, made an interesting argument about not being opposed to charging per se, but claiming that the current vehicle licensing and fuel duties, is already a road charging system and how would you integrate this without disadvantaging certain aspects of society?

Question: Was there a consensus reached about the future of Britain's transport system?

Peter Hedges: One of the interesting themes to emerge was the need to keep as many options open as possible in terms of how you actually manage transport systems, and that big projects aren't necessarily the solution - particularly looking to the future.

Certainly one of the major themes that came up was the need to look at all transport modes. Certainly it is true that in the past there has been major emphasis on car and vehicle transport systems. There is a need for transport research to look at other modes such as walking and cycling for example.

If you're looking at how to address congestion issues, there will be a need for research on how to integrate road system management with land use. So it's not just about how to improve the road system but also how you ensure that the locations where people work and live are better designed so that vehicle journeys become less necessary.

Some of the presentations at the Showcase Event were focused on commuting time. In recent years the commuting time has stayed fairly static, but the distance people travel has gone up quite a lot.

I think in terms of future directions of research, there are two pre-requisites. Firstly there is a need for technology research to be integrated with social and people research. It's not just about designing better cars - it's about understanding people's behaviour as well.

Secondly, transport research needs to become broader to deal with multi-modal aspects of transport rather than focusing just on roads or rail.