Road Clippings Jan-Mar '99Road Clippings Jan-Mar '99Transport Commission launched with Shipley MP in charge (T&A 30/3/99)
A new road to getting around (Aire Valley Target, 18/3/99)
Have a say about buses and trains (T&A 17 Feb)
Bingley traffic flows (T&A 17 Feb)
Road means more cars (T&A, 5 Feb 1999)
Letters to the Editor, T&A, 5 Feb 1999
SIR - Recent presentations by officials of the Highways Agency are increasingly convincing people of the need to cancel the damaging and wasteful Bingley Relief Road (BRR). A member of the Bingley Neighbourhood Forum (January 27) was resoundingly applauded when his question exposed that neither the Highways Agency nor the Council know how to deal with the extra traffic that will be dumped on Saltaire, Shipley, Nab Wood and Cottingley New Road if the BRR was built.
The Highways Agency claim that the BRR would be "for Bingley" and not for Saltaire or Shipley. Yet an official disclosed that the combined traffic flows on the existing A650 and the proposed BRR in the centre of Bingley would be 60 per cent more than goes through the town now, and the existing Main, Street will still carry a lot of traffic.
It was also revealed that no assessment has been made of the increase in air pollution to be experienced by residents of areas close to the proposed BRR.
With public transport, hospitals, schools and social services starved of investment surely there is a better use for the £60 million planned for the BRR.
R J Butler (Bingley Environmental Transport Association), Villa Road, Bingley.
By Robert Sutcliffe (T&A 17/2/99)
Aire Valley residents are being urged to have their say on transport development in the area before work begins on the Bingley relief road.
The road, which is due to open between 2004-5, is expected to cut traffic in the town centre by 60 per cent. Work is due to begin in 2001.
But Bradford Council wants to kick-start discussions on how to develop bus and rail travel in the short term, before the predicted benefits come into play, and in the long term to ensure that all the towns and villages along the valley see traffic improvements.
A report to the transportation, planning and design committee next week will reveal that the Council is already working with the Highways Agency and other interested bodies, such as bus operators, but that it wants more input from the public.
Measures already highlighted for consideration before the road is built include park-and-ride facilities at railway stations along the valley and minor improvements at Saltaire roundabout and the junction of Otley Road and Valley Road.
In addition, Shipley MP Chris Leslie wants radical plans to be discussed, including the possibility of providing bus information modelled on the London Underground where advice about approaching trains is flashed up on noticeboards.
Mr Leslie said: "I am going to see a Government minister about the relief road tomorrow, to talk about progress in general. Now the road is going ahead I am conscious we also need to be developing public transport to a much higher standard. At the moment you need a PhD in bus timetables to know how to use them, and there are problems over unpredictability."
Members of the public are being urged to give their views through the regular neighbourhood forums and to the newly-formed Shipley Constituency Area Panel Advisory Group which meets for the first time on March 11. Mr Leslie is also helping to set up an Aire Valley Integrated Transport Commission, in conjunction with Shipley and Keighley Area Panels, which is expected to hold its first meeting in the spring. It will be made up of representatives from interested parties.
Coun Latif Darr, chairman of the transportation, planning and design committee, said: "We have always said we wanted the relief road to go ahead but we also said it must not stand alone. We must look at all the traffic problems in the area as a whole.''
Letters to the editor (T&A 17/2/99)
SIR - I am an avid reader of your newspaper, but sometimes despair of the factual information contained in readers' letters which can cause more concern than is really necessary.
The letter from Mr R J Butler (Bingley Environmental Transport Association) on February 5, is factually incorrect. In my position I have attended several presentations given by the Highways Agency to interested groups here in Bingley. At the Neighbourhood Forum Mr Butler refers to, the officer actually said that: "When the Bingley Relief Road is built, the scheme will remove 60 per cent of the traffic from the centre of Bingley town and will attract 'new' traffic (approximately five per cent) which currently 'rat-runs' over the moors, back to the trunk road network".
Using today's figures this would mean that the volume of traffic in Main Street would reduce to approximately 12,000 vehicles each day instead of the 30,000 now. The official did not say there would be "60 per cent more than goes through the town now", as stated in your letters column.
Is it not time, now that the decision has been made to proceed with the building of the relief road, that we all pulled together on this to get the best for Bingley in the long run.
David Dinsey, Bingley Town Centre Manager, Main Street, Bingley.
by ROBERT SUTCLIFFE, (Aire Valley Target, 18/3/99)
Chaired by Shipley MP Chris Leslie, it has been set up to investigate what can be done to improve public transport in the area now the Bingley Relief Road has been given the go-ahead.
But he has yet to decide on whether to allow anti-road protestors to join in the forum. Taking part will be representatives from all the public transport providers in the Aire Valley including Metro, First Bradford Buses, Northern Spirit and Keighley and District.
Transport users will include the West Yorkshire Passenger Transport Authority, Aire Valley Rail Users Group, bus passenger representatives and delegates from Sustrans, the cyclists supporters group.
In addition Keighley MP Arm Cryer will be a member, together with Councillors Hazel Gundry, chair of Shipley Area Panel, Coun Philip Thornton, chairman of Highways Sub-Committee and Bingley councillor Eileen Sinclair.
The meeting will take place on Friday, March 26 at the Holiday Inn, Shipley
Initially its meetings will not be open to the public but there will be opportunity later on for their views to be put direct to the Commission.
Mr Leslie said: "The Commission's aim is to help produce an overall integrated strategy for transport along the Aire Valley
"The twin transport investments of the Bingley Relief Road and the Leeds City railway station improvements will offer a real opportunity for operators and user groups to improve existing networks and work towards making public transport a more attractive option.
"We now need to make plans for how to use the relief road's construction for the benefit of Bingley Main Street.
"Essentially we have a blank canvass. The time for rehashing the old arguments has long gone. The protesters need to grow up and get past it."
T&A 30/3/99
The Aire Valley Public Transport Commission has been launched as Keighley & District Travel unveiled 12 new buses worth £1.5 million.
Chaired by Shipley MP Chris Leslie, the commission is aimed at integrating public transport in the wake of major announcements on the Bingley relief road and improvements to Leeds City railway station.
Among the groups involved are Railtrack, the Highways Agency, First Bradford, Bradford Council officers and local councillors.
Mr Leslie told representatives at the launch at Shipley's Holiday Inn: "I am not in any way claiming to be the greatest public transport expert in the world but I want to see this issue handled in a much more pro-active way.'' Keighley & District Travel also launched its new Volvo single-deck buses which will link Keighley and Bradford via Aire Valley towns.