Traffic & Transport
‘Without us, no wheel would turn’: the unsung heroes keeping England’s transport moving | Business
Not many people get to park their car here – bang in the middle of Heathrow airport, on the taxiway just a stretch of grass away from where a line of passenger planes is coming in to land.
It’s close enough to see the shimmering air and smoke as nose tyres hit the tarmac. “An A380 will put down as much rubber as a car’s entire tyre,” Jack Quantick-Thorne says. He knows – part of his job is to ensure the runway team scrapes it off and patches things up overnight. And it is all recycled, he adds.
The airfield operations officer is not in the limelight much, but is one of a host of unsung workers keeping transport moving. And some jobs far from the public eye turn out to be not only essential, but surprisingly challenging.
Jack Quantick-Thorne, airfield operations officer, Heathrow
Passengers might only catch a glimpse of Quantick-Thorne from a window seat on landing, if he grabs the paddles to marshal a plane into the exact designated spot at the stand. “People just think you’re that person with the table tennis bats,” he grimaces slightly, as the Guardian requests a demonstration. “That’s like 5% of my job.”
In fact, most planes are now brought to the stand via laser-guided electronic displays. But human marshalling remains a crucial backup. Brandishing the paddles, Quantick-Thorne beckons in a taxiing British Airways arrival, the pilot peering down from the cockpit and steering 50 tonnes of plane straight towards him. The nosewheel travels bang on the guideline, stopping exactly in position for the airbridge to swing in and allow passengers to disembark.
Nerve-racking? “No. When you’ve got a really big plane, an A380, you need a second marshal right by the wheel to check it’s stopped in the right place,” he says.
Back in the car, the job continues: “I’m patrolling, I’m looking around, scanning everything – is the refueller doing his job properly, has the aircraft got chocks under its wheels?”
That includes monitoring the road system under Heathrow’s airfields, recognising every vehicle and checking any infringement: drivers here can also clock up points on their licence, if he spots them.
Officers also need to look out for wildlife – particularly birds, a serious danger for jet planes (and vice versa). How does he deal with them? “We’ve got methods of dispersal,” says the airfield operations officer.
These, marvellously, turn out to be speakers on the roof of the van, which play a range of bird sounds: “If I saw a flock of starlings, if I played a starling noise, the starling would think, ‘Oh, maybe there’s a predator nearby,’ and they fly off.”
And, he demonstrates, “I’ve got common gull. Black-headed gull. I’ve got a falcon”.
Are there falcons? “No,” he explains patiently. “So you think about it from a bird’s point of view. If there’s a pigeon over there, best play a falcon so it will fly off.”
If he now knows birds, it’s the planes that drew him here. He was previously at Nats, the air traffic control centre in Swanwick, managing the planes, but never up close. There is more to it than the paddles – but, he confesses, he takes every opportunity to use them, and records each plane that he has marshalled, including every aircraft in BA’s short-haul fleet.
Being a pilot is the dream, he admits, but the prohibitive training costs – £100,000 or more – put it out of reach. For an enthusiast, he reckons the job is the next best thing. Last year he had to tow the Concorde that still stands at the edge of the airfield across for an exhibition: “It was the first time one had moved in years – incredible to see in the rear-view mirror.”
Chris Thackaberry, network traffic controller, Transport for London
The day starts in Victoria Station House overlooking the bus terminus, a grand old building that looks considerably less so inside, where Chris’s desk is surrounded by hundreds of cardboard diversion signs.
About 500 of the capital’s 19,000 bus stops are on his patch in Westminster – home to some of Britain’s most congested streets, where dozens of bus routes cross. Roadworks are the bane of the bus and Thackaberry’s job is to keep them moving – armed with a van, pliers and zip ties.
Sometimes he can plan for roadworks months ahead. But other days are less predictable, when life suddenly blocks a route: “It could be a broken-down vehicle or a burst water main, but I’ve had windows falling out of buildings, I’ve had a collapsed horse on a bridge. I had an upside down Lamborghini in Piccadilly … I don’t know if it was sticking to the 20mph limit.”
His incident response van contains an orderly standing desk area and even a printer to rustle up more signs if needed, as well as spill dry sacks, ready to suck up any diesel or oil leaked over the road.
It also has two cylinders affixed to the wall containing “spit kits” – swabs to pick up any saliva aimed at staff, with clear bags to seal, ready to take the evidence to the police. “It’s just part and parcel of when you’re working in London, for anyone in uniform.”
In a sweltering Trafalgar Square, as he hunts in the midst of four lanes of traffic to hitch his cardboard signs to any available piece of spare street furniture, the complexity of the puzzle becomes clearer.
“There’s so many routes go through here, we’re fighting with ourselves for space.”
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Sarah, railway signaller, York
Gone are most of the signal boxes of old: these days, Britain’s railway is mostly controlled from one of 12 remote centres. From a windowless room in York, trains right down the East Coast mainline are guided on their way.
“In the old days, it was lever pulling,” says Sarah. “Now it’s a click of the mouse instead. Like a computer game scenario, but it’s real track, real trains, real people. We have to manually click, signal to signal, for every train that comes through our patch.”
Signallers have five screens at eye level showing the railway, and five above with timetables and traffic management information.
“When you first start the job, it feels so far removed. There’s no windows, it’s like a black hole in the middle of the building, but you are signalling trains from York all the way into King’s Cross. I remember thinking: ‘How many hundreds of people are on that train we’re signalling?’”
Anything from a circuit failure to a trespasser to a sick passenger on a train can hold up the lines. “Our job initially in any incident is to make the area safe – that’s first and foremost. And then we look for a workaround, to keep trains moving. The days when there are serious incidents are few and far between. But every day there’s something.”
Jamie *, public service vehicle engineer, Manchester
At Jamie’s bus depot, servicing the Bee Network, the first shift starts at 5am and the last ends at 1am, but engineers might stay through the night with a breakdown.
“In the daytime it’s routine: vehicles are inspected by law on a monthly basis,” he says. “But engineers have bus driving licences too, if a bus was to break down, often we’d take another one out to the driver to keep the service running.”
With city buses that stop and start frequently, there is typically more treatment and maintenance. And newer vehicles don’t necessarily mean less work, he says: “They bring a lot of new issues and we’re constantly learning, going back to college on courses to learn the tech.
“Electric buses haven’t made the job easier – but they and the new diesel engines are clean. Working back in the day, it was a hell of a lot dirtier, especially in depots indoors or undercover,” says the vehicle engineer.
He will check each bus’s brakes, emissions tests and inspect the nuts and bolts everywhere from the underside to the driver’s cab. “We see a lot in the press about the conditions in the cab, but we’re cleaning those buses: it’s like a greenhouse, and the heat from the engines also comes into our workshop.
“Even the drivers don’t understand what engineers do – I always say we are the forgotten people. But without us, no wheel would turn.”
Frankie *, baggage handler, Gatwick
The thing people don’t understand, explains Frankie, is that the placement of bags in the hold is not random. “It’s all done on weight distribution. You have to put baggage where you’re told – it is a very specific job, you do not deviate.”
At many airports, larger aircraft such as long-haul planes are loaded with bags already in large crates, lifted into position by machine. But short-haul flights at Gatwick are loaded manually. “An average bag is about 20kg and the average load is 90 bags off, 90 on, for three or four people. If you do eight turns a day, that’s nearly 30 tonnes your team is lifting. You get fitter – it’s like going to the gym, you end up lifting heavier and heavier bags.”
Passengers who fear for their luggage often make the job harder: “The worst thing is shrink-wrapped bags. It’s slippery, harder to hold on to, and less grip for the belt to pull up. And those straps around bags, they can get jammed in the belts and break them.
“People don’t realise how damaging it can be – and pointless. If you’re on a flight where customs do spot checks, they go for the bags that are wrapped. And there is so much CCTV and security. If I get caught opening a bag, I’d lose my job – why would I risk that?”
There are, says Frankie, more women doing the job now: “It’s getting more female-friendly. A lot of people choose this type of job to get into aviation: they want to be pilots or crew eventually, and just want to be around planes any way they can.”
* Names have been changed
Traffic & Transport
Number of cloned number plates on UK roads at record high, data shows | Transport
The number of reported “cloned” vehicles involved in offences on UK roads has reached a record high, official data shows.
More than 11,400 drivers contacted the DVLA last year after being issued with fines for offences they said they did not recognise or accept responsibility for – most of which are believed to be down to cloning, where a number plate is copied fraudulently on similar vehicles to avoid enforcement cameras.
The number of complaints about misattribution was 9% higher than in 2024 and almost double the figure recorded in 2018, according to the RAC motoring organisation, which analysed data obtained under freedom of information requests.
The rising figures underscore concerns about the number of illegal number plates in use, allowing criminals to evade detection and dangerous drivers to avoid being caught.
Although drivers should provide number plate suppliers with the V5C vehicle logbook and proof of identity, an investigation last year uncovered more than 130 official suppliers in the UK willing to sell cloned versions, which allow drivers to dodge police and congestion charges.
Cloning vehicles has left many innocent car owners having to struggle to prove they were not responsible when enforcement camera images apparently caught their vehicle committing offences.
A parallel concern is the use of “ghost” plates which are designed to be unreadable by the UK’s 18,000 automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras, which enforce safety measures such as speed limits or lane closures on smart motorways.
The RAC said the UK needed to overhaul an outdated and poorly regulated number plate system. Its head of policy, Simon Williams, said: “If number plate suppliers were carrying out all the checks they’re supposed to, it would be much harder for dodgy drivers to buy cloned plates in the first place. It’s only when a fine arrives at a vehicle keeper’s home address that they realise someone else is driving around using their vehicle’s number plate illegally.”
He said that more also needed to be done to catch drivers with ghost plates, “whether that’s more police officers being equipped with handheld devices that can detect if plates are unreadable, updating ANPR cameras and introducing higher security standards for number plates and for those who produce them”.
The government last month said there would be a new nationwide crackdown on illegal number plates, with funding from the Department for Transport for a new roads policing team. A new National Roads Policing Coordination Centre would share intelligence as well as trialling new technology such as specialised goggles to detect number plates that have been designed to be unreadable by cameras.
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Drivers using an incorrectly displayed number plate can be fined up to £1,000.
A Department for Transport spokesperson said: “We’re cracking down on illegal number plates with significant investment in a new roads policing team and innovative tech to stamp out the scourge of cloned numberplates.
“Illegal number plates help facilitate crime, and we are supporting the police to work with the DVLA to make it easier to report these crimes and support victims through a new digital tool.”
Traffic & Transport
‘A big responsibility’: Clifton Suspension Bridge master hails £7.6m renovation | Bristol
The job does not give the holder age-old perks such as the right to drive sheep across the great structure, but the title “bridge master” does have a certain ring to it.
“I don’t tend to say I’m the bridge master when I’m at a party,” said Tristan Ralph, the current holder of the title. “But people do seem to know and bring it up. It’s a job less ordinary, isn’t it? It’s a Victorian sounding title and people are really, really interested.”
There is, however, nothing ceremonial about the title. Ralph is in charge of maintaining and running the Clifton Suspension Bridge, a UK feat of engineering, without any public money.
“It does feel a big responsibility,” said Ralph. “When the chairman of the trustees rang to say we’d like you to do it, you suddenly feel the pressure. It’s so famous and people in Bristol, quite rightly, are proud and almost possessive of it. Bristolians think: ‘It’s our bridge.’”
The bridge master – and the not-for-profit charity the Clifton Suspension Bridge Trust – have the task of maintaining the bridge “in perpetuity”. “I’m a temporary custodian,” Ralph said. “When I’m finished, I have to make sure it is handed on in just [as] good a condition or better than I inherited it.”
Ralph, a bridge engineer by profession, was speaking to mark the conclusion of a large refurbishment project that has taken two and a half years and involved hand-painting more than 4,000 original iron chain links and installing an energy-efficient lighting system. It has cost about £7.5m. “It’s been a big job,” he said. “But it’s come pretty much bang on budget, which is rare these days.”
That is important because, to many visitors’ surprise, the bridge does not receive public funding. “The upkeep of the bridge, the running of it, the salary costs and everything are all paid only by our toll money,” said Ralph. “People think that we might get something from local or central government. But, no, it’s just the toll money.”
Motorised vehicles – including motorcycles – pay £1 to cross the bridge. There is no charge for pedestrians, cyclists or horse riders. As well as being a beautiful structure, it is also a vital part of Bristol and North Somerset’s transport system.
Ralph said: “It draws the tourists in. We get visitors from hundreds of countries every year but primarily, it’s still a vital piece of local infrastructure. If the bridge wasn’t here, the difference it would make to Bristol traffic would be incredible. We average over 8,000 vehicles a day still. Maintaining it as a transport link is utterly vital.”
The end of the refurbishment does not mean Ralph can rest on his laurels and spend more time hobnobbing with members of the Bridge Owners Forum.
“In a few years, we’ll need to paint the underside of the bridge. The under-bridge gantry unit itself will be replaced over the coming years. So there’s always something. We need to keep on top of things. It’s like your house or your car. If you just ignore it, don’t do things for a couple of years, they start breaking down.”
As in most walks of life, the climate emergency is a challenge Ralph and the trust are having to face. “We were monitoring the bridge daily in the summer with the very hot weather. And maybe if the bridge was being designed today, there would be a little bit more robustness around wind.”
The prevailing south-west wind is not usually a problem and the bridge rarely has to close but if it blows directly through the Avon Gorge it can be more difficult. “We need to keep an eye at both the magnitude of any wind events but also their frequency,” Ralph said.
The engineer admires the bridge’s designers, including Isambard Kingdom Brunel. “It’s remarkably advanced for its time.”
And there is no sign that its days are numbered, largely because the Victorians did not skimp. Ralph said: “There are three layers of chains. The original Brunel design only had two, but because it went from a timber design to a cast-iron deck, they upped it to three.
“There’s a little bit of comfort in there. Today there might be pressure to say, well, can you keep it to two, but in Victorian times they did like to add a little bit of meat on the bones.
“It doesn’t have a finite life. There’s no end date in our plans. We all just keep it going in the highest standards as we can. It’s in really good condition as long as we keep doing what we need to do, keep our attention on it and don’t let things drift. Forever is a long time but there’s no reason why we have any need to worry at the moment.”
Uber has begun a trial of autonomous vehicles on the streets of Manchester as it looks to bring robotaxis to cities around the UK.
The first self-driving cars are operating, using the technology of its partner firms Pony and Verne, with whom Uber recently launched Europe’s first autonomous taxi service in the Croatian capital, Zagreb.
Uber said it was “excited to take this first step toward making this technology accessible to people across the UK”.
In social media posts, Verne said it had “started our autonomous vehicle testing in Manchester”, while Pony said there were “plans to bring robotaxis to the city” and that testing was under way.
The tests involve the company mapping the streets of the city in north-west England with a safety driver behind the wheel and no passengers.
Limited passenger services started last month in London, but with a safety driver in the front seat of cars supplied by Wayve under Transport for London’s licensing rules for private hire vehicles.
The next steps are unclear. Opposition from Uber drivers, their unions and the capital’s politicians to the rollout of robotaxis is mounting. The GMB and ADCU unions have both said thousands of drivers jobs will be lost and have called for help for those affected.
A critical report from London assembly’s transport committee this week called for the government to devolve authority over autonomous taxi services.
It said there was “considerable uncertainty about many of the claimed benefits of autonomous passenger vehicles”, and fears over the impact on public transport and congestion, as well as safeguarding and accessibility for disabled passengers.
There has been no official application to launch passenger services in Manchester so far, and the vehicles are operating under government licence via the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) and the Department for Transport.
A spokesperson for Transport for Greater Manchester said it wanted the city’s taxis to be the safest in the country.
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“New technologies play an increasingly important role in the growth of our city region,” they said. “But they need to be introduced responsibly, safely and with real thought about what it means for our residents.
“Although no applications have been made to operate driverless taxis in the Greater Manchester, we’re aware of potential interest from companies to do so.
“Safety will always be our top priority, and we will need strong assurances that no vehicles will operate on our roads that pose any risk to residents.”
Uber said it expected to offering robotaxi trips in as many as 15 cities worldwide by the end of 2026, mainly in the US and the Middle East.
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