BRT – the new mayor's parlour game

In a surprise change of course, Bristol City Council – and presumably, its West of England Partners – have decided that bendybuses aren't the answer after all.  Or so we are led to believe....

What we really want is longer single-deckers with (like bendy-buses) two doors. Which means all those artists impressions might as well be binned. I wonder if they've told the bus manufacturers..... there'll be some worried workers in Ballymena tonight.

What's more, the BRT2 route will, at last, be diverted to serve Temple Meads!   Just what I've been saying for years......

It didn't need a meeting to decide it, it didn't need a consultants report, it didn't need the Cabinet Member with responsibility for Transport. It didn't even need the input of the council's own press officers.  

Instead, it came as a press release (*) from the LibDem group.   And instead of quoting the councillor responsible, the credit for this welcome proposal goes to none other than the deputy leader, one Jon Rogers, who also just happens to be running for mayor.

Which makes it even less credible than all the other unexpected announcements that emerge from the LibDems' transport spokesmen. Like Gary's transport hub and Tim's unmanned pods.

*  later discreetly removed - I wonder why

Jon Rogers is ditched as Transport Exec

It looks like Jon Rogers was a bit too radical for Bristol's LibDem establishment. At Tuesday's council meeting, they'll hand over his transport brief to Gary Hopkins, (who'll also find time to continue with waste and 'targeted improvement' - whatever that is). Jon will take on responsibility for care and health.

The more progressive part of Bristol will consider this is very bad news. We've all had differences with Jon - for instance over his endorsement of the South Bristol Link Road bid - but we all know that he's been ready to discuss things on line and in person, he's been very open about his ideas, and he's been ready to think the unthinkable (like the exclusion of through traffic from the Centre).

On the council's website, the page about current Cabinet responsibilities has been wiped clean.

But as I remember, another of Jon's responsibilities was sustainability. That doesn't appear in the new list of Cabinet responsibilities. Instead, Neil Harrison is charged with that portfolio as a mere 'assistant' to the Exec. Sustainable planning doesn't get a look in - though no doubt it'll turn up in the small print somewhere.

All of which seems to reflect the national lurch of the LibDems to the right.

Public Forum Party Games

Over the years, I've used the public forum part of council meetings to ask many questions and make a few statements too. For the most part, it hasn't changed anything, except to put put things 'on record' that would be otherwise hidden. Statements are politely received then forgotten. Answers are carefully crafted to give nothing away.

It was a bit different at last week's Cabinet. The topic was the bid for the South Bristol Link (Road + BRT), which they were about to nod through. Knowing that nothing I said about the rationale for the project would change anything at this late stage, I simply pointed out that new road building is contrary to Lib-Dem national policy.

For once, they seemed to listen, and I got an animated response.

Jon Rogers (who, I suspect, is quite embarrassed by having to push this particular project through) floundered a bit: "This is not road building, it is a link route, it is a Greater Bristol Bus link route, and although there is a road element within, it is clearly not just a road"

Hmmm... yes, a new road predicted to carry 1070 vehicles in the morning peak hour, compared with 200 passengers on the parallel bus rapid transit. If it looks like a road and it smells like a road.....

Jon went on to claim the 5-page 'eco-checklist' prepared for the meeting was enough to satisfy his party's expectation of environmental protection (although there are not yet any clear predictions of the wider traffic impacts of the scheme, )

We also got the repeated mantra that "This is not a Ring Road, absolutely fundamentally, it's not". Tell that to Steve Comer, who has told his Lib Dem colleagues how much easier it will be for him to drive from East Bristol to the Airport and beyond.

Mark Wright then weighed in, undermining Jon's case with a paean of praise for the road, and the traffic it would bring to South Bristol. Somewhat obscurely, he told us that you can't have new homes without new roads (possibly a coded reference to his ambitions for green belt development?) and that you can't take a six-ton sack of sand on a bus. Thanks, Mark.

No-one bothered to refute the case put in another statement from Mike Landen of the Alliance Against the Ring Road. But then Mike wasn't being 'political', he was just stating the reasons why the Link is a bad thing.

Then, of course, they voted to put in the bid.

Ironically, given the claims that the BRT element will provide access to the city centre and beyond for S. Bristol Residents, albeit by way of Ashton Gate (the scenic route?), the next item nodded through was the Hengrove to North Fringe bus rapid transit; which provides a far more direct and fast public transport link, making the South Bristol Link BRT redundant within minutes of being approved!

Oh No Jon, No Jon, No Jon, No

""Do nothing/minimum" is always an option"
Jon Rogers, re South Bristol Link, this blog, 28th October

"There is no point in asking people whether they want a scheme, that has been asked before, and we have, based on all the information, going back years, already decided to proceed to the next stage."
Jon Rogers, re South Bristol Link, email, 13th November

Cue a batch of questions for answer at next Tuesday's Cabinet meeting, in an effort to find out what the options really are, and to bring some of the realities of the road-plus-BRT Link into the public domain.

More of those later. Meanwhile, Vowles the Green has been tabling more challenging questions for Cllr Rogers at the same meeting. Like how can exponential economic growth, promoted as a 'Core Value' in the city's future, be 'sustainable'? Very fundamental question that. I'm looking forward to the answer, while not really expecting one!

Jeckyll and Jon

In his Dr Jeckyll persona, Jon Rogers excelled himself at this morning's Joint Transport Execs meeting, confronting the forces of darkness from BaNES, South Glos and N. Somerset. His anger wasn't enough to persuade them to relax their opposition to an Integrated Transport Authority for Greater Bristol, though.

What he did manage was to make them admit it openly. The cross-party consensus in the city that an ITA is the only way to achieve a half-decent public transport system evidently doesn't extend into the neighbouring Tory unitaries. North Somerset's Elfan Ap Rees -whose favoured transport is by helicopter - was particularly obtuse and nimbyish. He'd said at the previous meeting that he'd like to kill the ITA ambition stone dead. In the end, it may not be quite dead, but it's certainly stuck in a coma with no real hope of improvement.

That was the extent of Jon's challenge to the status quo. When it came to the South Bristol Link, I'd put my own statement drawing members attention to the absence of analysis, consultation, and future proofing in the one remaining option, and asking them to make sure that that there was still a choice other than saying 'yes' to it. No chance. The statement didn't get a mention, even to refute it, as the officers' programme to build a ring road was nodded through. Whatever Jon meant when he said here that "do minimum is always an option" remains a mystery.

(picture of Elfan ap Rees leaving the meeting, job done.
from boreme.com)

South Bristol Link: time to weigh up the option.

Spot the difference.....



This is what Jon Rogers and the other three West of England Partnership Transport Executive Members approved when they met on 1st October. These two road/BRT options recommended for further examination and consultation might have surprised them - after all, they'd not been among the five shortlisted for the previous round of consultation or for the 'Options Appraisal' study of their probable impacts. Nonetheless, the Execs nodded it through.



This is what the two options favoured in October have now become. Somewhere, somehow in these last four weeks the southern option has been dropped. All that's on the table is the BRT to nowhere and the 'northern option' road. That's the one that squeezes 10,000 vehicles a day through the now quiet backwater of King Georges Road, swells traffic entering the Cumberland Basin by 20%, and increases journey times into the city centre. All in the name of cutting congestion, cutting emissions, and some nebulous claims of regeneration.

So now we're invited to comment on just one option. Hobson's choice. The 'consultation' takes the form:
"We welcome your views on the scheme - please help us by answering a few questions at the end of this pamphlet."

OK, I'll probably do that before deadline day. But I wonder if they'll first answer mine?

* Who took the decision to cut the two options mandated by the Execs, to just one?

* How are you going to cope with the extra traffic you'll bring to the Cumberland Basin - especially if a stadium and a superstore get added to the mix?

* Will you keep the bus rapid transit in the scheme, subsidising it to make up for its losses?

* How on earth will you explain yourselves to people living on the route?

* How do you square this new ring road with:
Cutting CO2?
Peak Oil?
Cutting congestion?
Getting people out of their cars?

* Whose tune is it that you're dancing to?

Two cheers for Jon Rogers

Two cheers for Jon Rogers. Presumably he's behind the city's response to the airport expansion plans, now awaiting a decision from North Somerset council.

Given the 'official' council position, after it first mutilated, then adopted, the motion that Charlie Bolton brought to full council back in March, outright opposition to expansion was never going to be an option.

Still, there's lots of constructive comment in there. In particular, it points out BIA's failure to put a persuasive case for the economic or environmental benefits of expansion. It calls for a far stronger commitment to noise reduction, and notes that road traffic generation will lead to a worsening of the already unacceptably poor air quality in the city if expansion goes ahead.

On climate change, it notes that, even excluding the worst offenders, the aircraft themselves; "the proposed development will significantly increase the West of England carbon emissions and make it difficult to meet our existing reduction targets (which exclude aviation emissions) particularly due to increases in surface transport CO2 emissions". As if it wasn't difficult enough already.

But sadly, the mitigation measures it suggests are no more than tinkering at the edges. More airport buses to more destinations, that sort of thing. The elephant in the sky is ignored.

And there's a disturbing, if predictable, reference to the South Bristol Link. Remember, that's the one currently under consultation to see whether it should be a road, a public transport, or a hybrid route? Looks like the decision's already made, it's to be a road, a final link in a South Bristol Ring Road. The response says "South Bristol Link would be likely to reduce airport traffic on Bristol's network in the vicinity of Parson Street gyratory....". I don't think that'll be down to the passengers from Hengrove who'd get the rapid transit over to Ashton Gate to change on to the 'Flyer' coach.

That's the trouble. It's hard to criticise the airport's added climate change impacts when you're busy doing just the same thing yourself by building more roads.

Hat tip: Bristol 24-7 for the news item.

Travellers Trials

5 weeks after Bristol's travel shop closed, its sole 'replacement is a single desk in the corner of National Express's office at the Marlborough Street Bus Station, staffed by a harrassed First employee. A difficult job.

It's awkward to reach for most travellers, and lacks both information and capacity to meet demand. For a city with pretensions to provide integrated transport, or to be 'green', it's an embarrassment.

How any newcomer to the city is expected to find their way round is a mystery. The present system is fragmented, trains at Temple Meads and Parkway, country buses at Marlborough Street, city buses scattered all over the place. Ferries (of course) in the floating harbour. And nowhere where residents and visitors can get an overall picture of the city's transport.

For First, this seems a fairly typical commercial decision. Company policy never reflected any ambition to attract more passengers, just to cut the costs and increase the income from those they have. First were providing staff at the Colston Avenue travel shop - now they're not. Job done.

The complacency of Bristol City Council is something else. They too have saved money, but at the expense of throwing away a key public service. When asked about it by me and by Mark Bradshaw at the March council meeting, the responsible Exec member, Jon Rogers, could only say he hoped to provide some leaflets for a stand at the Marlborough Street desk. And yes, there are some leaflets about some buses - but nothing about trains, bikes, or ferries. No maps either.

It's not working, Jon. It was never going to. You want to improve public transport? Information is the key.

..............

Two people who had sussed out how to get to Tyntesfield boarded an X7 Clevedon bus in the Centre today. They showed the driver their travelcards and asked if they were valid for free travel. He said he thought not, and asked what cards they were. They replied that they give them free travel back home in New Zealand.

The driver explained that they'd have to pay, about £13 plus return for the pair of them. Or, for a very little more, they could have day passes. The couple were horrified and decided not to go to Tyntesfield after all!

Fare's fair

Now there's a coincidence! On Tuesday I mentioned here how the ABus no 57 service from Stockwood has a ticketless £1 flat fare system, and how that cuts boarding times, and journey times.

Tonight the Evening Post carries a story reporting that the council's transport lead, Jon Rogers, is suggesting an off-peak £1 flat fare on the buses to cut waiting times and to help fill up the buses. Jon is an avid reader of the local blogs.

Should I be flattered? Or should I be sending in for my five-figure consultancy fee ?

What bus? and where?

Here I am, shoulder to shoulder with Bristol Labour Party's finest. Mark Bradshaw's put up a petition to keep the 'TravelShop' on Colston Avenue open. His signature is quickly joined by others from the Labour front bench. And by mine.

It's all provoked by the First Bus decision to pull out of its partnership with the council in running the shop. As they provided the staff, that can only mean closure - unless the council brings back some of its own public transport staff to do the job.

I've already tabled questions about the closure for answer by Mark Bradshaw's successor, Jon Rogers, at the full council meeting on Tuesday - most of all to ask how they'll provide an 'over-the-counter' information and advice service to the travelling public if the TravelShop is allowed to close.
..........................
Oddly enough, Mark Bradshaw has his own questions to put to Jon Rogers at the same meeting, but he's using them to perpetuate a myth of his own making, in true Mandelsonian style. He's looking for confirmation "that a transport interchange at Temple Meads remains a key component of the (rapid transit) bid"

Transport interchange, eh? This is the site he has in mind. Of course it will look different by then. The rapid transit bus from Long Ashton P&R will call here at a stop (described as a 'docking station'!) so that Temple Meads passengers can dismount with their luggage, walk on through a new subway under Temple Way, then continue through a new office-retail-residential development, all the way to the railway station. Other buses (at least, those buses that come anywhere near Temple Meads) will continue to use Temple Way. Not a good place to transfer between buses, bus to train, BRT to ferry etc. etc. But that's Mr Bradshaw's idea of an interchange.

The proposal for a REAL interchange is quite different. It would have buses from all over the city converging on a hub immediately outside the 'Digby Wyatt Shed' at Temple Meads - click the picture and you can see it as the brick building in the distance. Network Rail and First want to turn the Digby Wyatt shed into a state-of-the-art concourse for Temple Meads passengers; all mod cons like real-time information, ticketting and advice, seating, light, safety, refreshments, retail. And there's stacks of room to cater for bus, ferry, and rapid transit passengers in just the same way - instead of leaving them at the scatter of exposed shelters somewhere near the station.

My own petition for this has drawn some very positive public response, but for some reason none of the Labour, Tory, or LibDem councillors has yet signed up to it. Nor has Kerry McCarthy MP, who's playing for time by trotting out the Bradshaw docking station/ interchange myth. That's especially surprising, given that few of her Bristol East constituents can get to Temple Meads in a single bus journey.

You can't help wondering if they've all been nobbled by the site owners or developers, who want to cover the lot with more offices, flats, and shops. Such things do happen!