As Government Ministers consider the expansion plans for Birmingham's Metro, Gary Clarke, chairman of the local transport authority Centro-PTA, explains why the system is vital if the city is to beat congestion...
Drivers in the West Midlands say that transport is a more serious issue for the region than health or education and want tackling congestion to be a top priority.
Congestion is hitting the regional economy too. The business community estimate the cost of delays to people and goods at more than £2.5 billion a year.
And when the Institution of Civil Engineers canvassed wider views on transport problems it found that nearly three-quarters of people believed improved public transport was the best way to beat road congestion - and only one in ten said the answer was to build more roads.
Planning the transport future for the West Midlands is entering a crucial phase. A major piece of work on the impact of congestion will inform how we could tap into the billions on offer through the Transport Innovation Fund and the West Midlands metropolitan councils, together with CentroPTA, have just submitted our joint Local Transport Plan to Government.
That plan names the top priorities for the West Midlands as New Street Station, expanding the Midland Metro and developing a network of 'red routes' to keep all traffic flowing more freely.
In the Birmingham rush hour the majority of commuters now travel by public transport, despite constant and sometimes justified grumbles about the levels of service. So we believe that better buses, better local rail services and expanding the Midland Metro has to be the best way forward.
Across Europe, city-regions have transformed themselves with investment in public transport. Trams have been making a comeback both as an agent of urban renewal and as the spine of modern and revitalised networks. Impressive new systems have been built in places like Strasbourg, Grenoble, Karlsruhe, Dublin, Nottingham and Birmingham's sister city Lyon.
Light rail has shown itself to be one of the most successful for reducing congestion in an urban corridor - and for enhancing the environment where quiet, pollution-free vehicles can penetrate busy city centres. The new trams are also doing a good job at raising the profile of places across Europe. They quickly become part of the street scene and the image of a modern city.
Midland Metro Line One now performs at 98 per cent reliability - the best track record of any public transport in the region. It was built mostly along a disused railway route, and now regeneration of adjacent land is well underway showing how it has become a catalyst for new development.
But Line One only does half the job. Why should passengers only be able to travel as far as Snow Hill when their destination actually lies in the city centre?
More recent studies, such as a critical report by the National Audit Office, stress that successful lines must join up areas of passenger demand and this is why it has been crucial for the Birmingham extension to provide linkages with New Street, the ICC, city centre shops and good interchange with other forms of public transport.
The Metro expansion plans now being put to Government will create a network of 26 miles with almost 50 stops and easy connections with bus and rail services, plus park and ride.
As well as improving the environment in Birmingham city centre, it will provide high-quality public transport through both residential and commercial areas of the Black Country along a route from Wednesbury to Dudley and Brierley Hill.
It will give direct access for people to Wolver-hampton, Birmingham and West Bromwich centres, as well as supporting the regeneration of significant areas along the route and development of Merry Hill and Brierley Hill.
By connecting up areas of demand in this way the new Metro is expected to attract 20.8 million passengers a year by 2015.
Trams arriving at Snow Hill are already packed solid in the rush hour. So, in order to meet this increased level of demand, we will need more frequent and high capacity trams.
A fleet of 40 new vehicles will be able to carry more than 200 passengers each, with trams every six minutes on the Brierley Hill line, 15 trams an hour into Wolverhampton and averaging every four minutes through Birmingham city centre.
The Midland Metro will provide a service for passengers that most cities will find hard to beat.
In Nottingham, a city a quarter the size of the West Midlands, the new trams started operating at a frequency of eight trams an hour, but this was increased twice in the first year to meet growing demand and a 20 per cent switch to public transport at peak times. Dublin too has seen initial fore-casts exceeded by two million passengers.
This all adds up to a congestion busting equation: the more people there are using the tram and other public transport, the fewer cars there are on the roads.
In Nottingham, traffic levels in the area served by the new tram have fallen by eight-nine per cent. There needs to be an adjustment to the traffic system of course and in Birmingham work with the city council and extensive modelling has helped us to forecast the impact.
The overall Metro scheme will also include contributions to highway schemes to further reduce snarl ups at key pinch points such as Five Ways, Holloway Circus and Ladywood Middleway.
After much hard work we now have an excellent business to submit to Ministers, with the benefits of the scheme exceeding the costs by a comfortable margin. By the Department of Transport's own criteria the financial sums add up to value for money. The results even fall into the 'high' value for money category when the wider regeneration benefits are taken into account.
We believe this £430m scheme has a strong case for winning Government support and we are asking for £322m from the Secretary of State on top of the local contributions and private sector funding already earmarked.
Back in 2000 the Government's Ten Year Transport Plan was talking of up to 25 new light rail schemes in the UK by 2010. The West Midlands was somewhere in the middle of the queue.
Now we'll be lucky if we see five new lines. Funding has been refused for several schemes, notably Liverpool's Merseytram, Leeds and extensions to the already popular system in Manchester. Despite this, the Secretary of State Alistair Darling firmly denies he is anti-tram - only that the cost escalations in those cities left him little choice.
The critical point for Midland Metro will come at this next stage. This is the point at which the financial bench-mark will be set. Whether or not we keep within budget will be measured against the figures that were approved by PTA and are about to be sent to Ministers.
Much of the cost over-run in Liverpool and elsewhere has been a result of private sector risk premiums applied to bids. Anything that could mean uncertainty for the tenderer - whether it is over engineering issues still to be resolved or political uncertainty poses a risk to the investment - so we have been working hard to make sure there is a minimum of risk.
This has involved working up the design in more detail such as engineering drawings for Park-head Viaduct or actually digging trial holes in Birmingham city centre so the construction company will be sure of the ground
conditions it will face when laying the track. This work costs money, but is seen as spending now to deliver a greater saving later.
We also have a procurement model that splits the work into three separate contracts and this approach has been welcomed by the Government. That is a good sign.
There is still a lot of hard work to be done and partnership will be the key to delivering this scheme on the ground. Tomorrow we have a meeting of West Midlands council leaders to work through and agree the local funding package. We are committed to involve local communities in how we plan the construction process, especially to keep disruption to a minimum.
We shall keep on talking to the business community about the complete package of public transport measures, not just the Metro.
It will have been a long haul from the opening of Line One in 1999 to seeing trams in Birmingham city centre in 2012. Hopefully the next expansion phase won't take quite so long.
Although a trip to Nottingham is not so far away, for most people in Birmingham it is difficult to visualise the scale of the improvement the trams will bring.
We know that light rail has helped beat congestion across Europe. The experience of other cities is that once people see the benefits of modern tram systems they want more.