Educating the whole world about transport… apart from UK students

The UK has a long-standing reputation for excellence in the provision of post graduate degrees in subjects such as transport planning and, as a consequence, UK?transport planners have always been heavily involved in overseas projects. Today, however, the number of students taking these degrees from the UK itself is dwindling rapidly, with overseas students stepping in to fill the breach. Rik Thomas reports

Rik Thomas

07 October 2011

In spite of the sectors current difficulties, UK universities are continuing to launch new transport Masters courses

The new South Bank Masters got underway last month with ten students onboard, whereas the long-running distance-learning scheme at Hasselt University in Belgium has taken in five new students this year – but none from the UK

The best that can be said about most of the UK universities that currently offer Masters degrees in transport is that they have steadied the ship, after student numbers dropped significantly in the 2010/11 academic year. The MSc offered by Imperial College in London, for example, is, a spokesman for the course advisory board says, “on target” to have 50 MSc students in the current academic year, which is approximately the same as last year.

However, this apparent stability masks a...