Symbolic Forest

Long-term readers will recall that, particularly last November, I’ve been covering the local guided busway developments: to whit, the West Of England Partnership, the quango which is, you could say, the haunting ghost of Avon County Council, and its plans to turn an old railway line into a private buses-only road. Sort of. Railway lines, of course, aren’t generally wide enough for that sort of thing; so they will mostly be building half a road.

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Keyword noise: Ashton Vale, Bedminster, Bristol, Bristol Harbour Railway, buses, guided bus, Prince St Bridge, railway, Southville, Spike Island, transport, West of England Partnership.

Yes, it’s back in the news again. The Ashton Vale guided busway route, which I devoted several posts to at the end of last year, has reared its ugly head again. A quick update: the local councils want to convert a chunk of South Bristol railway line – most of which operates as a council-run heritage railway – into a private buses-only road, to replace the current park-and-ride bus route through Hotwells. They had a consultation about it. Now, 7 weeks later, the consultation results are about to be revealed.^*

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Keyword noise: Ashton Vale, Bristol, Bristol Harbour Railway, buses, Cumberland Road, guided bus, Mark Bradshaw, Prince St Bridge, transport, West of England Partnership.

Time to return to the West Of England Partnership’s misguided Bristol Guided Bus project,^* I think, although Councillor Bradshaw never did reply to my last email. The rude chap. In the meantime, I’ve been poking my nose around the Winterstoke Road area.

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Keyword noise: Ashton Vale, Bedminster, Bristol, buses, Cumberland Road, guided bus, Mark Bradshaw, transport, West of England Partnership, Winterstoke Road.

Through my door the other day: a leaflet from the West Of England Partnership, the organisation made up of local councils^* that replaced the dead and unlamented Avon County Council. It’s about their proposals for a guided busway scheme in this part of the city. A new road, in other words, limited to buses only. Some of the buses on it would be expensive new buses cunningly disguised to look like trams, and running on “sustainable fuel”;^** the rest would be the boring ordinary diesel ones that already serve this area. It would replace the current park-and-ride buses in this area, which are already the nicest and most modern buses in this part of the city. So, frankly, I don’t see why that’s the bus route that most urgently needs replacing.^*** You can see their proposals for yourself, on the Partnership’s website – they very carefully avoid using the term “guided busway”, and instead call it “rapid transit”, using the word “bus” as little as possible.

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Keyword noise: Ashton Vale, Avon, Bristol, Bristol Harbour Railway, buses, Cumberland Road, guided bus, heritage, Mark Bradshaw, marketing, public transport, railway, West of England Partnership.