Mick Hamer's Wheels Within Wheels had an explosive impact when it was published in the late 1980s as Margaret Thatcher's Roads to Prosperity promised more of the UK covered with asphalt, more cars and more pollution.

Hamer looked at the role of road makers, petrol companies, and the AA and RAC (together known as the Road Lobby) in forming post war transport policy, which took shape at a crucial meeting as the Second World War came to a close - when the motorway map of Britain was drawn. Over the next 40 years, these organisations and allied politicians set about making that map a reality ... a job about to be continued by the current Government.

Hamer's book ignited the anti-roads protest of the late 1980s and early 1990s and inspired such celebrities as Swampy and Animal, who were the most prominent of the many campaigners who tied themselves to trees and locked themselves underground to stop road development, drastically (and critically) pushing up the cost of development and forcing a transport rethink by John Major.

Unfortunately, the original book is now dated, although still a good read. With roads back on the Whitehall agenda, a new Hamer is needed to bring the transport crisis back into focus.