Hotwells: the Westernmost Outpost of Greater Bedminster

Hotwells -for that is the name of the undeveloped western harbour area- is part of Greater Bedminster.

Yes, much of it is north of the harbour, but it is on the flatlands, just north of the harbour.

While Clifton isn't that far away, it's a brutal climb up that Hill -and when you get there, there's only Clifton Village to show for it. Apart from the pubs, a chip shop, a very small library, and an underwhelming convenience store, there is not much there. If you live in Hotwells, and you choose to head south, you can you make your way to Asda, and buy food amongst the friendly community that always seems to be wandering those aisles. And nowadays, you have all of Southville to explore. Your parks and green spaces are also south of the Avon.

That's why the council plans for the Cumberland flyover are more than just changes in Hotwells, they are an attack on South Bristol. In particular, to propose putting a two- or four lane road alongside the Avon, through that green space which connects the Avon to Grenville park, is something straight out of 1970s Bristol road planning. Even Glasgow has backed off doing things that awful since the early 1990s (M77 and Pollok Estate, for the curious).

Our mayor is proposing destroying the unspoiled nature of the southern gorge. Proposing building a four-lane road over what today is the best view you get to the Clifton suspension bridge. Proposing making today's walking and cycling route from Hotwells to Bemmy yet another multi-lane bridge where are all walking and cycling facilities and be an afterthought. Yes, they mention "improvements to cycling", but without spelling them out -you know they'll be afterthoughts or extra lights we have to wait 15 minutes to cross the junction. And you know that as the cost of the project overruns, as the schedule overruns start to be measured in years -the "value engineering" of the project will result in the exact outcome which Avon Crescent got from their Metrobus promises: fuck all.

Why is he doing this? Because it is obvious to everyone with a spreadsheet, that large amounts of money could be made by building houses on the land which the flyover currently uses. The only way to turn flyover into profit is if you can think up another way to get people across the river. Clearly, and attempt to estimate how much a tunnel would cost to build has shown that even before you include the inevitable massive cost overruns, it's too expensive for the people hoping to profit from the land sales to fund -and nobody else is willing to. The only way you can convert that bridge into housing is if you find someone else to put the bridge. A nearby park and the side of the gorge which doesn't have traffic jams is the obvious solution -and if that doesn't work, there is always the bridge to Spike Island, which combined with knocking down some of the historical buildings of the harbour, gives you another place for the bridge. Obviously, if the council proposed building the houses on that parkland, they'd expect some resistance. Selling off the Plimsoll Bridge land space and then handwringing over how about road now need to go somewhere else lets some people make their money -too bad that South Bristol will lose a bit more of its green space and that the nice bits of Hotwells destroyed to put in the bridge which will be needed once the current bridge has been sold off for redevelopment.

So yes, we are opposed to this. Expect more coverage on this topic to follow

Keep the children out of our way: save felix road playground, Easton!

In the posh parts of the city, the parents keep their children safe in the backgardens, with only trampoline-related injuries to fear (there's lots of posters about this in Bristol Kid's hospital, which is a bit late by then).

In the bits of the city where people are too poor to afford gardens, there are two places that kids can go outdoors

1. Parks
2. Roads

We obviously prefer them in parks, not just for their own safety but to avoid holding us up -every child that walks over a zebra crossing holds up traffic in each direction for 15 seconds; every child that presses the button on a pedestrian crossing adds 30s of delay.
One child out in the streets can cross 8-10 roads an hour.

Across the city, that adds up. And as the holidays approach, we fear for the impact all of these children have on our schedule

Which is why everyone should sign the petition to save Felix Road Playground!

Every child who spends the day in this playground is a child who isn't holding up important people!

Final possible candidates: Dave Dobbs and Phil Plover

The election is here today, and it is everyone's duty to get down there and vote for someone.

One option is Dave Dobbs, who cites is place of residence as a van in Stokes Croft. That's his key positive feature. If you've seen the flyer about how he believes a great flood came from Mars, well, he's clearly barking mad. But so is Gideon Osborne! And Michael Gove! And they have even more power and influence.

Being totally off your rocker should not be a barrier to holding political positions.

Anyone else: Phil Plover.  He's the candidate from the Waltham Forest party.

We had a look at his transport "ideas", as it's the one we care about.

"It might be good if Bristol gets some sort of rapid transport system – maybe trams or some sort of monorail. "

A monorail. People would laugh at as. Has never tried the one at Birmingham Airport?

" Open up bus-lanes - these are typically empty most of the day whilst the lane next to them is chock-full of slow-moving congestion, spewing pollution out for twice as long as necessary!
  Trams never needed a whole lane to themselves, laying empty 99.5% of the time. So, treating car drivers as sensible people who do care about the environment for them and their children, I would like to suggest a deal with Bristol motorists: when you see a bus behind you, pull in and let it pass - like you would an ambulance. It adds only seconds to your journey time!
  That way, we don't need to waste roadspace on separate bus lanes springing up all over the place, and ALL lanes can be available to ALL traffic, ALL of the time.   Simple, safe and sensible. 

This is good. the exclamation marks show him as one of those evening post commenters who can solve the city's issues with the word "simple!!!" at the end of every sentence.

His key idea here is that people should drive down a bus lane, but when a bus comes up behind them, to get out of the way. It's an interesting idea, let down by his naivety

1. Bus lanes are for short stay parking; you can't drive down them for that reason. This is why buses are usually in the car lane.
2. If you've ever seen an ambulance trying to get up Stokes Croft to Cheltenham Road in the evening rush hour, you'll see that people don't get out of the way for it. When they do, each lane pulls to one side, the left hand side half up on the pavement. Nobody is going to do that for a bus, unless it too has sirens and flashing lights.

"Make junctions more efficient ("1 in – 2 out") - to avoid delays and make travelling more efficient for everybody, where there is room, divide traffic approaching a junction into two lanes."

What he seems to mean here is actually have two lanes approaching a junction -as this will make it more efficient.

unfortunately, he appears not to understand basic queue theory -not even the wikipedia article. For Mr Plover then:

1. A queue develops whenever the number of items leaving a channel (i.e a road) is less than the number entering it.
2. Widening the approach to a junction is simply "making a wider queue". It does nothing to the overall throughput.
3. With a wider queue, the jam may not appear as long, but it has the same number of vehicles, the same egress rate -and hence the wait time is the same.

Or to summarise: making the approach to a narrow road wider makes no difference whatsoever to your journey time -unless it encourages more people to drive that route in the belief it will -which will then make things worse.

People complain that politicians have no understanding of maths and science -this person is, sadly, an example.

"Where pavements are excessively wide, reduce them to 4-6 feet and create free parking space, where possible (except where large pavements are used by the community eg Gloucester Rd)"

We don't know where he lives, but in the inner city we view all pavements as parking spaces

Increase free parking wherever safely possible - I believe there are a lot of parking restrictions (double yellow lines and meters) where they don’t need to be – consequently, that roadspace is often underutilised while motorists drive round and round, increasing congestion and pollution, seeking an alternative.

We love this "its the restrictions that cause pollution" -theme, we'll have to use it ourselves. It implies that we do care about pollution as we drive our diesel van with the broken exhaust round the city, leave it running while we deliver some special toys to our customers -and it's all down to the fault of the council that small children die of asthma.


  Open up as much roadspace as possible so people can do what they need to do and go home again

we find parking restrictions like double yellow lines no barrier to "doing what we need to do:
 

Controlled Parking Zones (CPZ) – personally, I would find the idea of having to pay to park in my own road very frustrating. It’s mainly a problem where parking is very badly restricted. If parking were freer, it might not be a problem at all. 

No, this is one naive little bunny. Those residents of the expanding CPZ zone aren't paying 30 quid a year for the right to park outside their house -they are paying for the right to use their car during the day -because they can be confident there will be somewhere near their house when they come home. As for the "problem where parking is restricted", no -is where there isn't enough room for all the residents and commuters, even when the pavements are fully utilised (e.g. montpelier)

There' s a risk here that the "motorists drive round and round, increasing congestion and pollution" theme could come back to haunt him here -in a CPZ, there is no point driving round. Hence the pollution and congestion falls.

The whole theme of this manifesto is that the author doesn't live in the city -he lives in one of the suburbs and gets really frustrated sitting in a traffic jam by an empty bus lane, when he gets into town gets angry the only free spaces have double yellow lines, or you have to pay to use -and that his secret near-centre parking zones are being made residents only in a deliberate attempt to make his life harder

Remove large slabs of concrete - Surely squashing vehicles closer together can't make sense. If there's room to keep vehicles further apart, that reduces the risk of collision and means you have somewhere to go in case of emergency (eg a child or elderly person falling into the road).

It turns out this means "remove the build outs that force you to slow down entering quieter roads"

There's some interesting maths here; a mix of game theory (conflict and reactions to collision risk), and probability. Specifically that "somewhere to go in case an elderly person falls into the road"

With a wider buildout, there is more pavement for the elderly person to fall onto, so P(fall-into-road) is reduced; with the reduced cornering speed the energy in the collision is also reduced. Phil's assertion "you have nowhere to go in an emergency" implies that swerving is the tactic, not braking, and that there is no oncoming traffic, so swerving is a viable action.

If you do swerver, not break, then the original amount of energy going into a person falling into the road depends on the probability of you hitting them

e = P(falling)*(1-P(swerving))*mass*velocity^2

In  the new layout
e' = P(falling')*(1-P(swerving'))*mass*velocity'^2

We'll leave it to the readers to work this out -the quick summary is obviously that the velocity-squared variable is the main factor in damage; the probability of swerving out the way would have to get four times worse to result in the same damage reduction as cutting vehicle speed in half.

Sadly, as Phil Plover doesn't get queue theory, probability and statistics will be beyond him too.

There we have it then. The candidate for the evening post commenters. Someone whose entire world view is based on "obvious" answers, yet without the basic mathematical underpinnings to recognise that his obvious is, to us, obviously wrong.

Dave Dobbs it is then!

B.T. nearly-approved Candidate: Owain George

As we fear that Cllr Gollop will betray us, our next favourite candidate is Owain George, candidate for Clifton

.

He says clearly

• I will recognise that cars are the preferred means of travel & free up the city so they can move about again
• Stop the extension of bus & cycle lanes where they do not work, are counter-productive or actually dangerous
• Deal with problems affecting the flow of traffic in the city
• Welcome businesses with staff who need to park at work
• Create more on street parking so that independent shops & businesses can compete with shopping centres

We actually suspected that he was some spoof candidate, as he's almost the opposite of George Ferguson.

• George Ferguson: red trousers, runs a brewery, praises cycling
• Owain George: blue trousers, runs a pub, praises driving. Poses for a photo with his hand on his "tender parts" to show how sensitive he is.

Our real concern is something different: Owain George owns the Albion Pub, Clifton.

Albion Clifton used to be nice pub in Clifton to which you could drive, leave the engine running, pop in to have a swift 8 pints and then carry on with your HGV delivery schedule. Used to be.


Today, the has council needlessly blocked Boyce's Avenue to parking. Here we have a mayoral candidate that can not even stop the council taking away the parking spaces from outside his own pub. How can this person claim to be able to push back the anti-car actions of our city!

Worse than this though: today the Albion is a gastropub.

Gastropubs are a plague upon the hard-working delivery drivers in the city. Before, we could nip into places like the Albion, the Pump House and many other destinations, to take the edge off a tiring job. If you were really hungry: go to a cafe and have bacon and eggs.

Now those pub owners refuse to serve you unless you sit down and order veal with your quails eggs, and make you pay five pounds for some "authentic" beer.

Similarly, he offers to create more on-street parking. It's a nice promise, but where? Clifton has even run out of corners to corner park on -which would leave the zebra crossing between the Albion and Clifton Village proper -but that's where tesco's HGVs park for deliveries.


 


There we have it. The one openly cyclist hating, car parking advocate for the mayoral elections turns out to be a gastropub owner who can't even prevent the street in front of his gastropub becoming pedestrians only.


This is why we think that even though his opinions may be aligned with ours, his inability to execute on them renders him worthless even as the #1 'disposable' vote.


Who does that leave? Spud Murphy, who appears to have left a Wurzels concert after too much cider -and frankly would make Bristol's reputation for being provincial worse -or that traveller who cite his address as Stokes Croft and judging by the manifesto has clearly imbued too much of the Stokes Croft retail pharmaceutical portfolio. No, not Chris Chalkley -someone else.

Bristol Traffic Mayoral Election -Candidate Gollup: cycling city is safe in my hands:

We now have officially backed two candidates for the City for holding opinions that match with our goals: Cllr Gollop (cons) and Owain George (clifton)

Cllr Gollup has already been documented as the sole councillor prepared to denounce the cycle city program
 As he said in 2001:
"The Cycling City initiative brought in match-funding which has delivered new cycling routes but these have largely been achieved at the expense of the majority of road users - by reducing road space or capacity

That is precisely what we think. Except now he is either lying through his teeth to get elected, or he has completely betrayed us. He is quoted in the Evening Post this year:
"Getting more people cycling is absolutely key to the future of the city because it will also reduce the city's carbon footprint and congestion during the rush hour."

​

Councillor Geoff Gollop says as mayor he would encourage sport and cycling

We hope he's  just taken some advice from his London leaders, and is now is lying to get into power.

But how to know. We've tried to contact him to ask "are you really holding strong to your principles and just lying to get elected, or has something happened to your brain?"

No answer.

The Mayoral Elections

So far we've been silent on the topic of the elections -it's down to the conservative and UKIP candidates to see who gets the white-van vote. Although the tories are targeting the white van constituency at the national level, Cllr Gollop is now being pro-cycling city, which makes us worried. It could just be he's realised that the elves of Somerset and the dwarves of Gloucestershire have no vote, so there's no point promising anything to the commuters who keep this city afloat.

 
What we haven't seen from that candidate is any sign that he really does support these bicycle things, which is why we do think it is just a facade. It's the other candidates that worry us.

Here we are shocked to see Cllr John Rogers, LD candidate for the election, alongside his folding brompton bicycle and looking cheerful, here in the autonomous district of Montpelier, leaning his toy vehicle against the community bike rack put in to help the vans turn the corner.

The Bristol Traffic Project is considering conducting interviews with all the candidates, to see where they really stand on the issues that matter. What questions should we ask? And remember, they have to be questions that support our agenda, not some hippy-hobbist anti-motorist plot

Bristol Council reclaims Thomas St for Parking!

With the rollout of the Kingsdown RPZ, one of the secret parking places of the city was lost.

Rejoice though!

The residents of Fremantle Square have complained about its loss, and they have had their place returned,


No longer double yellow lines.

No longer (as it was before), a fading Keep Clear sign -still shown on Google Maps.. Now there is a sign proclaiming that any resident can park here on weekdays; anyone evenings and weekends!
  
We do note that this is actually marked on the Bristol Cycling Maps as a recommended cycle route, and fear that without formally closing the road the markings are invalid -hence some tax-dodging troublemaker could get cars ticketed for obstructing the highway.

The minor bit of clearance at the corner may be the get-out clause here,

Bristol's answer to Cycle Lane Parking

At last, a solution to Bristol's traffic problems.

Let's just hope the council has ordered enough.

Street Art in Stokes Croft

Here at Bristol Traffic we know nothing about creativity. But we're not slobs. We like a bit of art.

And... we have to drive our White Van about quite a lot when we need to buy a new screw, or pick up a cold pasty. Which means we often find ourselves driving through Stokes Croft heading for the Tesco Express there (with it's convenient cycle lane to park in) at lunchtime before we head to the pub.

Known as Bristol's Cultural Quarter Stokes Croft is home to much of Bristol's artistic and creative community. The area is awash with pop-up shops, cafes, squats, street drinkers and shouters, and general all-round goodness (well, if Tescos is shut, we can always use Slix or Ritas). And, it comes alive with music at night, which makes it pretty much a 24 hour space.

The southern approach to Stokes Croft looks like this:

We buy our paint at the trade counter here, so we know there are many successful and creative artists working out of sight of the general public in places like the Jamaica Street Studios, Hamilton House and The Motorcycle Showroom. Unknown, but also hidden from view, are the many thriving digital media businesses which are also in the area. Their effects are more visible on a web-page or phone app. If your broadband is slow, blame them!

More apparent, when visiting Stokes Croft, are the many Street Artists that have managed to display their various works on buildings and walls around the area. Some are famous, some are not.

What we'd never realised, though, was just who the most prolific Street Artist / Tagger in Bristol is.

It's you!

Your tax pays for Bristol City Council to do some stunning artwork in the streets.

It's April 1st today, but this is not a joke.

Camera Enforcement Vehicle: Bristol declares war on school parents

"Camera Enforcement Vehicle". An odd term. It has a hint of Mad Max's "Interceptor", back in the days when Mel Gibson did half-decent films. In Mad Max, the interceptor existed to catch criminals threatening the streets and the safety of citizens.

We are sure that the council thinks their Enforcement Vehicle is there for the same goal, but we know what it has done: it has declared war on hardworking school parents who have nowhere to park their 4x4 for child dropoff except in the School Keep Clear lanes.

Today: when you see the traffic officers outside the school you know to drive pass, take the five minute hit on child dropoff to avoid the ticket. Once they've been and gone, that's it for the term. Safe. But not now.

Look at this car  R009OVT. It's got a camera on top, a GPS unit lurking inside. Now all it has to do is drive past a school and it can take a photograph of all the parents parked in the parent-parking-zone, then send them tickets later. Because it can do drive-by ticketing, it can cover multiple schools in a day -increasing the risk of getting caught. And you don't get any warning, you won't know to detour on the dropoff that day. After the dropoff: uncertainty. Did they pick on you today?

Worse yet the ANPR school parking car is not just targeting school zigzags, but also anyone stopping in a bus stop. Is it really so bad for people to have to get off the bus in the middle of the road? If people are worried about safety then the bus driver could simply drive on to the next stop (as they are apparently officially expected to do)!

They are enforcing loading restrictions, so stopping legitimate traders like Tesco from stopping their vans outside shops during rush hour. What sort of priority does Bristol put on the economy?

Even worse: the Evening Post isn't on our side here. They have joined the War against Motorists, in the same week the evil anti-car EU bumped up fuel prices by declaring an oil embargo against Iran. This is just victimisation

There's only one way to defeat this: stand firm.

Make sure nobody from your kids school calls Parking Services on 0117 922 2198 giving them the school location and exact time morning and evening when they would catch the most parents on a drive by.

Similarly, make sure they don't email parking.services at bristol.gov.uk giving them the same details, or telling them of your favourite secret bus-stop short-stay parking areas.

If nobody tells them of the places and times they should be enforcing parking at schools or in bus stops -we will continue to be able to exercise our right to do so!

pavement work in Southville

"MB" sends these shots of some vehicles in Greenway Bush Lane. Southville.

He notes that even the trucks are parked on the road.

Only one vehicle is showing how much they care about their paintwork and wing mirrors that they choose the pavepark option.

We don't see what MB is complaining about.The council owns the task of repairing all the pavements in the city, and, as such, have the right to park on it. The only unusual thing is why nobody else parks their either.

Monty regains its van friendly reputation

What with the 20 mph zone and all, some people may think that Monty no longer welcomes vans.

Not so!

First, we are pleased to show the first ever double parking event recorded in Montpelier.

We didn't know it was technically possible, but with the BMW in the yellow line area and the van FH02EKZ up on the pavement, we have reclaimed Picton Street!

Round the corner, Picton Square.

Can you see that? A missing bollard. Finally it can be used again for short stay parking, instead of a wasteland for pedestrians. Today HY08UOK is celebrating this shared space.

Meanwhile, over in Montpelier St Werbughs, the council van RF58NRZ is showing others how to park on a corner with double yellow lines. The chosen parking option allows for excellent visibility and does not hinder the progress of other large vehicles.

North Fringe Route Update

Both cyclists who read this site will be interested to hear that the North Fringe cycle route, linking Abbey Wood with the Farm Pub, will be installed this weekend; the schedule still says "February". Here is the view from the B&Q side.

Sadly, for those cyclists, the council is still looking at selling off the land, so the greenery may not last for long.

Further up the route, the council is preparing for the event by parking vans saying "look out for cyclists" up on the pavement.

By parking directly opposite a road junction, the council van CN06CXR ensures traffic approaching Wordsworth Road will know to look out for bicycles.

Bristol Engineering Projects - Merry Christmas

This is the season of Christmas cheer, so spare a thought for Bristol City Council's "Bristol Engineering Projects Team". This secretive bunch are the people who put the traffic lights in our roads and re-design our junctions.  We do wonder if occasionally, for a little bit of fun, they are behind all those particularly dangerous and annoying cycle lanes, installed as part of Bristol's failed attempt to become a 'Cycling City'. It’s sad to say but in these straightened times they seem to be running out of road “improvements” to carry out.


How nice, then, to see to see them busily working in Redland Green (a park) and discover that they are now finding new places to practice their art.  We love the fence that they are building across the park to make life difficult for cyclists, especially as there is a real chance that the fence might eventually injure or even permanently incapacitate a few of these freeloaders.  The fence on the Green really represents a great achievement because it has been constructed in such a way that it will make it hard for baby cyclists to learn their despicable habits. Quite literally, it cuts them short in their tracks.  Hopefully, they will all learn to drive instead with Second2none.  That is, if they haven’t been too badly injured by crashing into the fence, or crushing their driving fingers in the finger trapping gates (the gates are particularly impressive and may even prevent a few mothers and buggies from even making it to the playground).

The Bristol Engineering Projects Team appear to have cleverly managed to do the whole thing without even telling Bristol Parks. Let’s hope they can do it again and again so at last we will get some of these scruffy areas fenced in and preferably paved over.


Bristol Traffic applauds councillor Sylvia Townsend for her spirited defence of the fence at a recent Neighbourhood Partnership meeting, especially as she was entirely alone. We don’t attend such things but our spies tell us that the miserable local community objected to the fence one and all and have written hundreds of letters and emails against these forward-looking proposals.  Can you image that some of them even had the audacity to ask what the fence was for?  How mean spirited and narrow minded of them.  Clearly these residents are deluded in thinking that Redland Green is meant to be an open area of park for people to enjoy when we know it represents a great opportunity for highways thinking.

At the other end of the Green some road construction is already happening and a forest of railings going up to catch unwary cyclists and even a few small children.  We’ve been disappointed to see railings and bollards disappearing from roads because the nanny state panders to the whims of busybodies who pretend to care about the serious injuries to pedestrians and cyclists.  Well, we at Bristol Traffic are made of sterner stuff and we salute you councillor Townsend.


Pushed out of the highways maybe, but we are happy to report that highways engineering is alive and well in our parks.  


We feel that parks offer many opportunities. The area inside the fence must have already been earmarked as a car park which will at last make some proper use of this redundant space and who knows, there may even be a traffic light or too. Modest maybe, and we realise that this is a far cry from the major road schemes of the past, but there are so many things to be done in parks that we can be sure that the Bristol Engineering Projects Team won’t now run out of work.


Merry Christmas!

Sense at last

Common sense seems almost to have returned to Bristol City Council following their unsuccessful attempt to turn Bristol into a 'Cycling City'.

Whilst we object to not being able to park the Bentley in Boyce's Avenue during the day, we note with glee that a proposed new 'Pedestrian Zone' will also exclude cyclists, who will not be able to nip under the arch and so get into victoria square safely. With the moving of a taxi rank to a currently wasted double yellowed lined area on Clifton Down road for the installation of new loading bays and disabled parking, even cyclists not trying to use the short-cut will find their life less pleasant, which cheers us up.

We'll have our roving reporters out there, 10 - 6 every day, ticketing any cyclists that dare to disobey. 

Unless, of course, they object in sufficient numbers by 17th December to 

david.sarson@bristol.gov.uk

citing "Proposed pedestrianisation scheme, Boyces Avenue, Clifton" as the subject.

Luckily we know that very few cyclists read this blog, and we know that they're unlikely to ever find the Consultation Document on the web as they're probably to busy making lentil sandwiches for Christmas.

Council meeting today!

Today, Sept 7, is the next council meeting, where some protesters will be campaigning to protect the parkland of the city, such as here, the fields by Lockleaze, from progress.

The green party, are obviously against it.
Question is, what should the B.Traffic stance be?
To us, this green stuff is all wasted space which could be replaced by drive in superstores or more housing. But we fear something: the consequences -the congestion.

Look at this "field" above. Soon it will be a playing field for Fairlawn School. Behind the trees, the hill drops down to Muller Road, a key bottleneck in this part of the city, and a road you can waste hours on of a weekday evening.

There is no point redeveloping these forgotten parts of Lockleaze without adding a new dual carriageway to the M32!

There. We said it. S106 infrastructure money needs to go into either uprating Muller road to a full dual carriageway -as we've advocated in the past- or adding a new route to the M32.

Which is where an idea springs to mind. St John's Lane. From Purdown Camp down to Stapleton. Twenty years ago you could get car up it -admittedly, a stolen one you'd have to torch afterwards, but you really could drive all the way up it from Stapleton to Lockleaze. Not now. There's a gate in the way, relegating it to being nothing but a foot/bike path.

But sometimes, the gate gets opened by the allotment people, and the dream comes back.

A dream of a road, from here, the top of the city, right down to stapleton, and then, ideally, a new M32 on-ramp. Just a short one, like the Mina Road on ramp; enough to reward people with big-engined cars. And here, a place for the road to begin.

Look someone is trying it already, with their Peugeot 306, X615EDB, seeing just how far down the footpath they can get.

What better way to enjoy a summer evening than to drive down here and to dream of more dual carriageways.

Trivia footnote: the fields above date from the civil war; some of the hedges are apparently historical monuments or something. Presumably St John's Lane has the same history and access rules, despite the gate and the no trespassing signs. Sept 10, 1645, was when Prince Rupert of the Rhine and hence Bristol surrendered to the people, at least in the form of Cromwell's New Model Army. So what will happen this week, 365 years on?

Gary Hopkins: what do people have against him?

After the evening post denunciation, all was quiet on the Cllr Hopkins front, and down in St Werburgh's someone even stuck a painting of him up on the Mina Road tunnel.

Yet no sooner does Cllr Hopkins appear in the news boldly pushing a 20 mph zone in this part of the city, someone takes the spray can to the art

This is like pulling down statues of out of favour leaders in eastern europe -while they are still in power

Bacon Roll opportunities off Muller Road

At last there is a use for the widened pavement on Muller Road -part of the North Fringe Cycle Path, which is still ongoing.

The sign lets passing motorists, pedestrians and bicyclists know the current cost of a bacon roll at the van round the corner, in front of B&Q. As you can see, this is popular. The van itself is the one in front, two Sita vehicles behind it, more in the B&Q parking area.

And there's the problem, see. Parking. This van and its customers need more space than this side road can provide. What to do?

Well, when we turn the camera round 180 degrees, we get an idea.


There's a bit of a stream, then a large amount of space. Unused space. Well, technically it's parkland, but as the council say, "it is little used other than by dog walkers" . They say that in the document which discusses selling off the site for development.,
Possible open space disposals in the Horfield and Lockleaze Neighbourhood Partnership Area.

In Horfield Lockleaze, two spaces have been identified as low value and are proposed for disposal. In some cases the value of a space could be improved by its partial development, allowing housing to be built facing onto the space and providing natural surveillance to the remainder. Then, what is often a poorly and misused backland site, can become of greater value to the local community and attract more people to use it.

See that? An underused bit of green space can be be made useful by development. Because a big wide bit of greenery, without housing overlooking, it's too scary to visit. We don't propose housing though, we propose expanded car parking for the bacon buttery van.

There you have it then. Wasted greenery -grass and trees- which could be redeveloped.


There's just one small flaw in the plan. As they say in their document

Planning permission has been granted for a cycle route through this space to connect Dovercourt Road with the road alongside B & Q and from there to Muller Road, this includes a long bridge over the stream. This will effectively divide the space into two.

Yes, while the parks team have been busy working out how to save the council money by selling off parkland, those road-tax-funded cycle route planner people have been busy getting a cycle route designed here with a bridge going over the stream. Oh, the irony! We relish in it! There they were, thinking they designing a nice route to cycle through greenery, using Bristol Council land over the railway land option -because it would be easier- when someone else was trying to work out how best to sell off the land, and, because there currently isn't any cycle traffic through here apart from the odd MTB-er who does the stream at the top, ignoring the extra throughput planned. We laughing, obviously, while the locals and cyclists are probably wailing and gnashing their teeth. Just think -if people drove onto this parkland for picnics, like they do on The Downs, it wouldn't be up for sale!

What do we think? Well, those people who like a bit of greenery and a bike lane through it ought be dropping a note to the Lockleaze Voice people, saying, how do we stop this? But we, well, we are thinking how best to salvage what could turn out to be a completely wasted foot/bike bridge. Our solution: use the bridge to get to and from the bacon roll van! Our road tax, put to use!

Breaking news: lockleaze to be less forgotten

There are signs up hinting that Lockleaze is to be less of a forgotten quarter, primarily by adding more houses. A forgotten half, then.

The locals are upset about this, in the form of the lockleaze voice, and are organising a meeting with the council today, July 27, at 7pm in the Cameron House.

Some people no doubt expect us to be in favour of turning the green fields of Lockers into housing, but oddly enough, we aren't.

• Without adding a new dual carriageway up to the North Fringe, it will only make congestion on Muller Road worse.
• We are worried that it will force the teenagers on their motorbikes elsewhere, such as in our way on the road.
• There a no plans for a heliport. Helicopter parking is a popular need, yet there is nowhere safe to do it.
• We quite like looking at greenery when stuck on the M32.
• Important celebrities undergoing coke and alcohol dependency treatments at the discreet clinic nearby do not want look at the little people.

Consider attending if you too find your concerns coincide with ours or those of the residents themselves.

Evening Post! This is not the war on motorists!

The EP is upset that the council wants to turn 12 paid parking spaces into 72 on-road bicycle parking spaces. The title of their article "IF drivers think it's hard to find a parking space in the city centre at the moment, it's about to get worse.".

We love this. Some people are probably expecting Bristol Traffic to be up in arms on the same topic, but we are too busy laughing at the naivety of the E.P. to bother. Here is why we aren't complaining.

1. We have had a copy of the plans for about a year. If the E.P. is surprised, it means they are out-loop.

---------- Forwarded message ----------

From: "Nick Pates"

To: "Alex Woodman" , "Mark Wright"

Date: Mon, 13 Jul 2009 12:25:43 +0100

Subject: Pay and Display cycle parking proposals - Cabot

Dear Councillors,

As part of the Cycling City project we are proposing to remove

10metres of pay and display parking at seven locations to replace with

cycle parking. I have attached a plan of all the proposed locations

as well as a draft letter that I intend to consult with.

I would appreciate any comments you may have.

Yours sincerely

Nick Pates

Cycling and Walking

Bristol City Council

Twelve months ago these plans came out. Where have the E.P. reporting team been? Probably hanging around with Bristol City people getting wined and dined to believe that after England win the 2010 World Cup then its a cert for England hosting the cup in 2018, for which we need a giant supermarket in Southville. Got some bad news there, folks.

 2. We were consulted on the plans. We are Bristol's premier web site collecting data and reporting on traffic issues in the city. Unlike the rest of the motor lobby -the RAC, the ABD, the AA, we are rational. We don't just deny bad news or the entire process of science just because we don't like the answers. We collect data, and reach conclusions.

3. We support it! Really! This does not mean we have changed sides!

Why do we support it? Because they are taking away pay-to-park spaces, and nobody uses them as you have to pay. We much prefer zebra crossings, double yellow lines, traffic islands to a slot that demands money and which offers time limits on the parking.

3. The only people that park in most of the areas are students. Not tax payers. Students. We can see that by doing a drive by last week, out of term time.

Tyndall's Avenue: empty parking spaces. The university staff either have access to the car parks, they get the bus in, or they park+walk. 

Round the corner, Woodland Road. Utterly empty. We, the tax payers, have paid road tax already, so we refuse to pay extra to park. We'd rather drive around for half an hour to find an empty corner in Cotham then walk in.

The only people who use this are not only students, they are the students with enough money to pay for parking, which is a small subset of students: the ones with lots of money. We feel no guilt about having their parking options removed, so they can't drive over the downs for one lecture, half an hour in the gym and then home again.

The argument here is therefore not "bike parking vs car parking", it is: how do you want students to get to university?

1. By car. Only parking in the paid bits if they can't get a free space nearby -our spaces.
2. By bus. Not ideal, but you can get a lot more students to one bus than 40 cars, and they don't take away our parking spaces, as we have been known to park in bus stops too.
3. Walking. FirstBus hates this at the zebra crossings, we don't like it on Cotham Hill, but you can usually swerve round them while making a phone call, though you have to shout out the window rather than use your hand on the horn.
4. By bicycle. Yes, we despise them, but if they are going to cycle in, they won't try parking on our secret places like Highbury Villas. They may even decide its not worth walking or cycling down to the uni for half an hour in the gym, so not even get in our way on a bicycle.

The best bit: if there is no option to drive in, some of these tax-dodging students may not bring their cars at all, which will free up more street space in Clifton and Redland.

Now, can the E.P. stop being 12 months behind what's being planned and help join the coalition to fight US proposals to stop you doing things like downloading porn onto your laptop while driving.This is the real war, not some argument about how twelve students a day will get to the cafe for lunch.