The Scottish Government

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MINISTERIAL FOREWORD

The landslide events of August 2004 had a substantial impact on Scotland's road network and resulted in significant disruption and inconvenience to local, tourist, and commercial road users. In response to these events the Scottish Executive commissioned two studies encompassing transport and the environment.

One of these studies focuses on our procedures for assessing, ranking and managing the hazards associated with landslides and is published separately.

This report presents the findings of the second study, which considers the predicted trends in climate change and the implications of these for the Scottish road network.

Improving our knowledge of climate change and its impacts is essential to allow Scotland to cope with the consequences of a changing climate. These changes have the potential to affect us all. In common with other countries, Scotland is taking measures to protect the environment, tackling global warming and climate change by reducing emissions of the gases. However, a certain amount of climate variation is now inevitable and all countries, Scotland included, need to take action to adapt to this.

This study adds to our knowledge of the likely impacts of climate change in Scotland and, specifically, enables us to evaluate the implications of this changing environment on the Scottish road network. It provides an understanding of how these processes and developments may affect all road users. It also enables public concerns about safety and reliability of our essential transport infrastructure to be addressed.

The Scottish Executive is committed to tackling climate change and its impacts. We therefore welcome the recommendations of this study, which will enable a proportionate and pragmatic approach to be taken in the future design and operation of the Scottish road network - to the benefit of all road users.

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