Major alterations planned for Aztec West Roundabout, Woodlands Lane junction and Bradley Stoke Way.
South Gloucestershire Council and Bristol City Council have opened an informal ‘pre-consultation’ on planned changes to road layouts, speed limits and parking arrangements along the route of the proposed North Fringe to Hengrove Package (NFHP) MetroBus Scheme, which was granted planning permission earlier this year.
The ‘pre-consultation’ is a precursor to the preparation of statutory orders (Traffic Regulation Orders or TROs), which are expected to be published during 2015.
MetroBus represents a major investment in public transport, which the councils hope will change the way people travel throughout South Gloucestershire and the Bristol area. It aims to create a new network of high frequency bus routes with fast and reliable services linking key areas of housing, jobs, and shopping.
The NFHP scheme will link south Bristol with Cribbs Causeway and Emersons Green via the city centre. Locally, buses will travel from the Ring Road (A4174) along the yet-to-be-constructed Stoke Gifford By-Pass before traversing the full length of Bradley Stoke Way up to the Aztec West Roundabout.
The project will see a number of sections of new bus lane constructed along Bradley Stoke Way, including a long stretch running from the end of the existing bus lane adjacent to the Willow Brook Centre up to Patchway Brook Roundabout (near Aldi). There will also be major changes on the approach to the Aztec West Roundabout and reconfiguration of the Woodlands Lane junction.
New MetroBus stops are planned adjacent to the Willow Brook Centre and close to Patchway Brook, Webbs Wood & Great Meadow Roundabouts.
Digital versions of the plans can be viewed on the TravelWest website at www.travelwest.info/NFHPconsult. Paper copies are available for inspection at Bradley Stoke Library. Comments must be submitted by 9th January 2015.
An indicative construction timeline submitted with the NFHP MetroBus planning application suggested that construction work on the Bradley Stoke section of the route could start as early as April 2015 and last for 30 months.
Related link: North Fringe Rapid Transit (The Journal)
Just build some more roads for cars south gloucs! You are happy to take all the money for these extra houses, how about giving something back
And how much attention will they pay to residents views? The same as with the residents of Patchway I expect!!!
I have already given them my feedback. Briefly, I’m not convinced they have a solution to the daily M32 southbound jam. They are putting in a new bus-only junction next to stoke park, but the metrobus will then immediately hit the traffic and sit there in a slow crawl for 20 minutes before getting to the bus lane near the end.
I know there isn’t a lot of room for an end-to-end bus lane. How about a congestion-charging lane? Free for buses to use, everyone else pays £5 – enforced by ANPR.
This bus scheme will do nothing to improve the general traffic situation of getting in and out of Bradley Stoke in the mornings and evenings, it may even make it worse! Where is the extra general traffic provision, which is what’s needed the most. e.g. at the ridiculous single lanes leading to and from the Patchway Brook roundabout up to the Aztec West roundabout? Has the council surveyed the traffic to see how much of it is actually just trying to get to and from the motorway network to other places of work?
I think part of the problem is that at the moment it’s in the council’s interest to have traffic problems – it adds to their (rather questionable) justification for this Metrobus scheme.
The MetroBus scheme, whilst far from perfect does pay for a new connect road from Bradley Stoke Way to the ring road between UWE and the M32.
Whilst it also opens loads of land for more development, it does increase the exit points from Bradley Stoke, Little Stoke and Stoke Gifford.
The target time from Willow Brook Centre to The Centre drops from 50 minutes on the 73, 35 minutes on the X73 to 17 minutes.
Whilst these times are suspect, I hole heartedly agree with Jim that some sort of charging/road pricing scheme will be needed to ensure that the M32->Newfoundland Rd area stays open and is not blocked.
Finally, if SGC and BCC had not argued to a standstill about Aztech West vs Cribbs Causeway 12 years ago, we woul d have a tram system in Bristol, similar to Manchester, Sheffield and Nottingham; which would have been a much better solution.
And if these councillers think that this will be reducing congestion as everybody will use this bus rather than cars they must be living in cloud cuckoo land. I would love to give my feedback but the link doesn’t seem to be working.
@Pete, The TravelWest website, which hosts the MetroBus consultation page, is recovering from an attack by Muslim extremists.
See: Al Qaed Arr: Bristol bus timetable hacked by terrorists (who thought they would cause travel chaos in ‘the West’)
As long as they build it on areas where travellers have their annual holidays I wont complain!