What are the positives and negatoes of different modes of transport?

How has the UK transport network changed over time?

We all use transport to travel, but the ways we get around have changed. These days, most of our journeys are by road, rail, sea or air. However, this has not always been the case. If we go back 250 years, before the Industrial Revolution, the easiest way of travelling was by boat, on foot or on horseback. Many journeys were made by road, but they were not roads as we know about them. Apart from the well-constructed Roman roads built centuries before, most pre-industrial roads were little more than muddy and potholed tracks; vehicles were carts and carriages, not cars and lorries!

The first improvements to inland transport in the UK came with the building of canals and the use of barges in the late eighteenth century. They allowed heavy, bulky goods (or freight) to be transported more easily and cheaply over land. That paved the way for the Industrial Revolution to happen. Canals were followed in the mid-nineteenth century by railways and steam-trains that made travel much quicker. At sea, steamships replaced sailing ships for freight and passengers.

In the early twentieth century, the use of petrol-driven cars on smoothly surfaced, tarmac roads brought more individual freedom of travel. Every village and town became linked to a road network. In the past 50 years, air transport has taken off, allowing us to travel much farther and quicker around the world.