The Department for Transport’s Deputy Director Anthony Ferguson retires today after 38 years in the Civil Service, 35 of them at Department for Transport. For the last ten he’s been heading up the traffic technology division.
He’s told Highways News he’s chosen now to leave because of “motive and opportunity”. “Although I am still enjoying my career and feel the next few years could be really exciting, I am not getting any younger and the desire to spend time doing something new was growing, and the Department offered me a financial incentive to go,” he said.
Reflecting on where he thinks the country is with transport provision, compared to when he joined back in 1989, he said: “At its core, transport has not changed that much but in many ways it is unrecognisable. Rail and bus performance and road congestion and parking fines still preoccupy the public – perhaps they always will.
“I worked on a White Paper in 2003 about runway capacity at south east airports, and not a runway was built, though change is afoot. But much is different. I worked on the early delivery stages of HS1 and the Elizabeth line and both are now established parts of the transport network.
“Planning and paying for travel in London is so much easier than when I started work, even if the rest of the country has some way to go. I was part of the team that created the GLA in 2000 and watched as Ken Livingstone transformed transport in London and the way decisions are made. Now we see elected mayors in many cities deciding how to deliver transport in their areas. I was responsible for taxi policy when Uber arrived and it is hard now to remember a world when ordering a cab home was not just a couple of clicks of a smartphone away.”
Talking of transport, having spent a decade heading up a team to use technology in transport, he admits we are certainly not maximising the use of technology yet.
“There is a lot of great technology out there, a lot of which is quietly managing what happens on our networks and keeping them safe without anyone really knowing about it,” he said. “But what individuals can get through a smartphone is expanding and improving a lightning speed, and it is hard for the public sector to keep up and so it can seem slow by comparison. But I recognise how hard it is to change systems, processes and culture, especially when money is tight.”
Mr Ferguson has championed the Transport Technology Forum across the Department, supporting the work of the group’s manager, Darren Capes. “Much of what we talk about in the TTF is not in itself cutting edge technology but rather the need for cutting edge ways to deploy technology,” he said. “But I am an optimist. The UK led the world in using technology in the 80s and 90s to manage our roads, and the signs are that we can do that again.”
He reflected on his legacy within the department by considering his biggest highlight and achievement. “I have been lucky to do many interesting things and be part of huge infrastructure projects,” he says. “Hearing the Crossrail Bill receive Royal Assent in Parliament was a thrill. It was a big deal in its own right and the first time I was truly in charge of something of national importance. Motorists might not thank me, but managing to secure enforcement powers for councils outside London, which had been created in a Bill I had managed 20 years before, produced a pleasant sense of an ending. And it was lovely to meet Margaret Calvert when the traffic signing system she helped create with Jock Kinneir turned 50. Even if she did berate me about some improper use of her transport font!”
And his greatest frustration? “Probably micromobility. I became policy lead for e-scooters in 2018 after seeing more and more of them on my cycle ride into work and, fatally, asking who was in charge of the policy – the music stopped and I was still standing! We created rental scooter trials at pace in 2020 and made great progress in developing regulatory proposals. But the next stage has remained just out of reach. I am sure we will get there.”
Mr Ferguson says he was “fated” to work in transport, given his grandfather, John Dean, was an eminent bus operator in England and then in Kenya and was given an OBE for transport planning during WW2. “His first job was in Holloway bus garage in 1919, the year Ministry of Transport was created, which I guess is Karma! But the civil service has been the “prose” part of my life. I would now like to spend more time on the “poetry” part. Not writing filthy limericks, but tapping into the creative part of my brain. And if the mechanics pull her through, I also hope to spend time tootling around the country in my 1973 campervan. Will I do a “proper” job again? That remains to be seen…”
(Picture – TTF)
