Through traffic to be banned in parts of Bristol for ‘liveable neighbourhood’ scheme

Quote:

... a notorious rat run.

Talking of rat runs.

Also from that article:

Quote:

Melissa Topping said "there's a lot of people round here on low incomes who need their cars for school runs and work"

And finally: I wonder how many of the "more than 3,000" signatures on that petition are actually locals, who live or work there (and are not just people who drive through, or Conservative councillors in Sunderland or something…).

hawkinspeter wrote:

Also in that article there's this bit:

Quote:

One local mum who works in Barton Hill and drives from there to Whitehall everyday to pick up her children from school said she found herself 15 minutes late due to an increase in traffic. She left her work at Barton Hill Trading Estate at 2.45pm but claimed what would usually be a ten-minute car journey or 26 minutes by foot, took her over 45 minutes as a result of an increase in traffic congestion.

So, it looks like she can choose a 45 minute drive or a 26 minute walk. It's almost as if the scheme is encouraging people to walk short distances instead of driving.

  Problem is, too many people would still rather do the 45 minute drive and complain about it than do the 25 minute walk…

brooksby wrote:

... too many people would still rather do the 45 minute drive and complain about it than do the 25 minute walk…

No rounding - it was 26 minutes. Looks as though someone has walked it many times and found the mean to obtain such precision. Not just looked on google maps and decided that was simply unacceptable.

I have some sympathy for the 'not yet sufficient infrastructure' comment. The LTN will probably improve active travel within it's bounds, but at the west end you are still faced with Queen Ann Rd Tunnel and Silverthorne Lane (quiet, hidden, heavy construction for the last year and the next year), Feeder Rd (heavy traffic, murder lane), or Church Rd to Old Market (heavy traffic on a multi lane roundabout or flooded subways, then heavy traffic).

brooksby wrote:

 

  Problem is, too many people would still rather do the 45 minute drive and complain about it than do the 25 minute walk…

Same for rats (apologies for repeated link)!

"Surprisingly, two of the three rats chose to take the less efficient path of turning away from the reward and running to the car to drive to their Froot Loop destination. This response suggests that the rats enjoy both the journey and the rewarding destination."

But but but it used to be a ten minute drive?!

YOU'VE RUINED MY LIFE!  WHAT FOR?!

And lots of people will be able to say "yes - this thing here is worse for me now than it was before".  And because human loss aversion and the fact that people make far more noise when unhappy than they do when happy, this will become a "big issue".

To be fair to them the UK is at such a point of motor dependence / "cultural capture" by the motor and associated industries * that it almost certainly will get quite a bit worse for many people - for a long time - before there is a lot of better.

First - we will need quite a lot of push (negative measures - making driving more expensive, less convenient) as well as cosy pull (nice positive things like cycle paths which are good enough for children to use).

Then - we currently just discount many of the benefits of less driving e.g. less pollution, low level incidental exercise, quieter streets, nicer places, being able to walk easily, more efficient public transport (not held up by cars) etc. Because we don't notice or don't do those things, because our current system!

* Even without getting all conspiracy-theorist we are trying to work against the natural direction of some of the most well-resourced, best connected organisations with lots of very smart employees - who probably don't want a sudden career change.  Although the motor and fuel industries have provided us with several completely real, malicious conspiracies!  However if you want more of that see notjustbikes' video on SUVs or the dystopian vision of the robotaxi future.

YOU'VE RUINED MY LIFE!  WHAT FOR?!

So, like the Brexit vote, the dimwits hit out at some group they have no intention of ever joining- it's those cyclists and all those expensive empty cycle lanes

Credit to the author for attending the opposition meetings and trying to understand their concerns, but I agree with hp. There has been significant consultation, far more than I remember for any previous local decision, and council elections where the winning councillors supported the scheme.

The scheme also made it to the Mail Online. No link for the usual reasons. The article is a essentially lifted from the Bristol Post with more lurid language ('human shields'). Comments were 95% opposed to LTNs and 5% probably opposed too but unable to resist racist sneering about the protesters.

TBH the west (Barton Hill) part of the scheme looks like a much larger change than the east (Beaufort Rd) part. Some drivers living in the west will add a couple of kilometres to their journeys including some very congested sections, unless they switch modes. The planners have tried to accommodate this by allowing e.g care workers' cars through the bus gates, maybe that will prove the right balance in the long term.

When I first saw the scheme plans I did honestly wonder if it would be better to designate Avonvale Rd and Marsh Lane as boundary roads and furnish them appropriately. But of course that would mean taking away much of the car parking, so also controversial.

Evening Post wrote:

“We didn’t know they were coming, but somebody dropped a message on our WhatsApp and people just came out of their homes to stop this,” said Melissa Topping, who is in a wheelchair and lives at Victoria Avenue. She said the Liveable Neighbourhood would cause her huge issues with driving her large adapted car back home on the only route left to reach her house - down a narrow side road into her ‘LTN zone’.

“A couple of the workers completely understood where we were coming from when we explained that this would make things so much harder for the residents to get about,” she said. “We just told them that we weren’t going to be moving, so they would have to go away again, and they did. We were peaceful and they were very nice, and we do feel sorry for them, because they are only trying to do their job, but we can’t let this happen here,” she added.

“There are people who have to take their children to two or three different schools and then get to work. It’s simply not practical for people who need to drive and live around here, and the traffic is much much worse on the roads that everyone is now being funnelled down,” she added.

Ms Topping said she fully expected the council and its contractors to come back at some stage. “People power does work, but they are going to come back and we can’t be everywhere to stop this from happening,” she said. “We know they are going to come back, probably in the middle of the night, or something.”

Neighbourhood: you can't change anything because we have a disabled resident!  Also driving children to schools!  People power!

Also neighbourhood: continue driving and parking everywhere making it a PITA (or sometimes more) for the disabled resident, and not safe enough for children to walk or cycle to school.  "Lots of people" power (occasionally sympathetic, well meaning but generally I have to drive / park right here now so it's someone else's problem).

hawkinspeter wrote:

slc wrote:

More stuff: now we have some bus gates on Avonvale Rd and Pilemarsh. I have been looking at fixmystreet to see if anyone complains (or applauds) the LTN features, and this amused me

https://www.fixmystreet.com/report/6729314

It shows a brand new 'no motor vehicles sign' hidden behind vegetation. 

Why didn't they clip the vegetation back? It can easily be challenged if the sign is obscured.

Are you quite mad? They're the sign installation department - not the hedge clipping department. Where would we be if every Tom, Dick, and Harry took it on themselves to go around clipping hedges? It would be chaos!

mdavidford wrote:

Are you quite mad? They're the sign installation department - not the hedge clipping department. Where would we be if every Tom, Dick, and Harry took it on themselves to go around clipping hedges? It would be chaos!

<sucks teeth>  "Ah, well, you 'ave a point but it'd be moranmejobswurf"

brooksby wrote:

mdavidford wrote:

Are you quite mad? They're the sign installation department - not the hedge clipping department. Where would we be if every Tom, Dick, and Harry took it on themselves to go around clipping hedges? It would be chaos!

<sucks teeth>  "Ah, well, you 'ave a point but it'd be moranmejobswurf"

I have sympathy for the sign installation guy. The vegetation is overhang from a private garden, so the sign guy may well be instructed to report only.

Incidentally, the bus gate enforcement will not begin right away. Apparently there will be some variable signs notifying that.

hawkinspeter wrote:

slc wrote:

It didn't take long! My second time through and came across a delivery van driver mounting the pavement to get around the modal filter at the bottom of Beaufort Rd. He was quite apologetic but also seemed to think he had no option, even though the delivery address was right next to the filter.

Just the other day, Mrs HawkinsPeter remarked that our road seemed a lot quieter without all the rat-running and there's notably more traffic queues along Blackswarth Road (possibly also Church Road though I think that may already be saturated).

Meanwhile, here's a positive reaction to the planters that I saw being deployed next to St George's Park:

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/news-opinion/can-streets-anti-van-dweller-9696482

(I've got mixed feelings about moving on van dwellers, but they were taking over that section of the park which isn't really fair on other residents around there)

I saw that article - people saying 'can we have those planters everywhere to stop pavement parking' - but I suspect that the writers meant 'can we have those planters everywhere to stop other people pavement parking'

brooksby wrote:

I saw that article - people saying 'can we have those planters everywhere to stop pavement parking' - but I suspect that the writers meant 'can we have those planters everywhere to stop other people pavement parking'

Driving is the best thing in the world, if it weren't for all those other drivers parking antisocially, parking in "our" spot, pulling in and out when we want to get through, driving poorly, making unnecessary journeys and causing congestion ... not to mention all the pollution they generate, the damage they do crashing into things AND the potholes they cause.

If only they'd just stop and let us get on with it... (also see the cycle-centric version of "if only we removed all the dangerous / bad drivers we'd have no problems on the roads / people would be happy to cycle there (instead)").

brooksby wrote:

hawkinspeter wrote:

slc wrote:

It didn't take long! My second time through and came across a delivery van driver mounting the pavement to get around the modal filter at the bottom of Beaufort Rd. He was quite apologetic but also seemed to think he had no option, even though the delivery address was right next to the filter.

Just the other day, Mrs HawkinsPeter remarked that our road seemed a lot quieter without all the rat-running and there's notably more traffic queues along Blackswarth Road (possibly also Church Road though I think that may already be saturated).

Meanwhile, here's a positive reaction to the planters that I saw being deployed next to St George's Park:

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/news-opinion/can-streets-anti-van-dweller-9696482

(I've got mixed feelings about moving on van dwellers, but they were taking over that section of the park which isn't really fair on other residents around there)

I saw that article - people saying 'can we have those planters everywhere to stop pavement parking' - but I suspect that the writers meant 'can we have those planters everywhere to stop other people pavement parking'

It looks to me as though pavement parking on Beaufort Road has increased since the filters arrived. Perhaps drivers think that it is OK now that the through traffic is gone.