1837: A carriage must pay the toll at the Turnpike Gate. Picture Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty Images

For whom the road tolls

Did turnpike roads transform travel in the 18th century? Or were they a means for rent-seeking?

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Professor Jeremy Black and Graham Stewart discuss whether turnpikes transformed travel in eighteenth century Britain or represented a means of revenue-raising from traffic whilst offering marginal improvement in return?

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