New rail station for Bristol in transport upgrade
BRISTOL'S first new railway station in 15 years is to be built at a park and ride near Avonmouth.
The new station, which will by served by the Severn Beach line, is part of a series of transport measures due to be discussed by the city council's cabinet next week.
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Severn Beach Line
The authority is planning to spend more than £11 million on improvements to complement the planned Bristol Metro and Bus Rapid Transit schemes.
Government grants worth more than £200 million have been awarded for a series of projects to upgrade transport in and around the city.
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The council's spending includes money to pay for the new railway station at the Portway Park and Ride site – the first since Filton Abbey Wood opened in 1997 – and funding to help pay for development of the Bristol Metro.
The Metro will be the biggest upgrade of rail services for more than 50 years and is also likely to see the reopening of a passenger rail link to Portishead.
The new station to link the park and ride site to Severn Beach line rail services is due to open in around a year.
Other improvements include:
â An extra £1 million over two years to speed up the fitting of residential road and street lights with white light lamps.
â An extra £1 million to speed up road repairs and resurfacing over the next three years, including resurfacing on 24 roads across the city.
â £5.7 million for improvements to bus stops across the city.
Tim Kent, the Liberal Democrat cabinet member with responsibility for transport, said: "This year has seen a massive injection of funding into Bristol's transport by both the city council and the Government.
"This means that we can move forward with major infrastructure improvements across the city – to roads, street lighting, bus stops, and also help fund local improvement schemes through a £2 million total grant pot.
"This is in addition to the projects we've already given the green light in recent months – 20mph roll out across the city and improvements to St James Barton roundabout."
At the same meeting the Cabinet will be asked to agree that £4.65 million be put forward out of the total £10 million allocated to the Bus Rapid Transit scheme from the Invest in Bristol package.
The money is needed to cover the costs of developing Bristol's three routes over the next 12 months. Funding will be needed to help pay towards planning and licence applications.
Mr Kent added: "A huge amount of work is happening to prepare the way for the start of the Bus Rapid Transit's three schemes in the city.
"We need to get everything in place so that the Government sign on the dotted line and grant full approval for the bids.
"We're determined to deliver this major transport infrastructure on time and budget."
Comments
by katachua
Sunday, September 30 2012, 11:41AM
“@gary_hopkins
"The rail only zealots who cannot see that tracks do not serve all of Bristol and that a unilateral decision to rip up carefully constructed partnerships would spell disaster for all types of transport progress."
Indeed - tracks do not serve all of Bristol, but your bendybus scheme intends to rip up existing tracks and replace them with bus lanes...”
by katachua
Sunday, September 30 2012, 11:38AM
“@gary_hopkins
"The previous Labour administration in Bristol fought with the neighbours and prevented a possibly viable tram system 15 yrs ago."
I wonder which party was in charge of that neighbour at that time , Gary - do tell...”
by gary_hopkins
Sunday, September 30 2012, 8:17AM
“The reasonable question of "why does it take so long?"
Some answers.
1 Government in this country is far too centralisded.
Instead of local decisions being made and local money being applied to the solution we have the ridiculous situation of government sucking money out of Bristol wasting a lot of it on civil servants and then deciding if we can have SOME of our own money back to do what we want to do.
2 Regulations are very long winded.Rail has to be safe but there are more hurdles here than in supersafe Germany and Austria.
3 A bias against new technology.
4 The previous Labour government were anti rail.
5 The previous Labour administration in Bristol fought with the neighbours and prevented a possibly viable tram system 15 yrs ago.
The good news though is that the present government for all its Tory faults is more pro rail and is negotiating for us to keep more of the wealth created in Bristol under local control.
THe Severn beach line was a comparitively easy win ,but it did need negotiations with government over the franchise,but now we can deliver a fully integrated transport system that pulls together the rail metro,Gbbn and BRT with good interchanges and smart card ticketing.
What are the threats that would prevent that.
1 A Labour mayor who would spend 50% of time fighting with government and 50% fighting with the neighbours.
2 The rail only zealots who cannot see that tracks do not serve all of Bristol and that a unilateral decision to rip up carefully constructed partnerships would spell disaster for all types of transport progress.
Heavy trams have their problems especially in a hilly and constricted city (ask any Edinburgh citizen) but the Lib dems were very impressed with the Ultra Light rail . Unfortunately the bidding to get our own money back process was far advanced from the previous government , that our try for a technology change could not succeed,so it had to be a compromise.
BRT can be ammended and improved and once we have Transport for Bristol (opposed by the Tories and partly by Labour) we can make further improvements and bolt on newer solutions but we cannot go back to the bad old days of NOTHINg for Bristol!!”
by matic_113
Saturday, September 29 2012, 4:31PM
“Hopefully when they have built this one and realise its not that hard, it will set a precedent for similar future projects. Plus bin the BRT!!!!”
by J12345678
Saturday, September 29 2012, 1:19PM
“With all respect, we're not talking about new lines, we're talking about using the existing infrastructure to its fullest. Same as Henbury loop and Portishead. The lines are there but the politicians just stick their heels in the mud while wasting millions and millions on vanity project than achieve nothing whatsoever.”
by a1rhellair
Friday, September 28 2012, 6:05PM
“I cannot see why it takes decades to get anything simple done in this city"
Yes I agree, but it takes equally as long elsewhere. Here's an area I know. It took nearly 70 years to get a station built in an area classified as poorly served by public transport in metro london. It now links well and buses and trams - http://tinyurl.com/cvq24l5
The station itself is a good design, albeit a bit 'open plan'.
Agree that buses alone is not the answer. If I remember rightly, Bristol and South Glos argued away the tram project... http://tinyurl.com/cxuft78”
by J12345678
Friday, September 28 2012, 5:28PM
“Plenty of other places for new stations in Bristol. I cannot see why it takes decades to get anything simple done in this city”
by Magrathea2011
Friday, September 28 2012, 4:43PM
“I hope this welcome start will continue to include some more park and ride schemes eg at Portishead, Thornbury, Henbury and Saltford/Keynsham.”
by sheppas
Friday, September 28 2012, 12:37PM
“I really just cannot understand what must go on in Tim Kent's head? My two year old has more intelligence. Arrogant, ignorant and totally in it for himself.”
by smoosername
Friday, September 28 2012, 11:54AM
“@sheppas - "Buses are NOT the answer to Bristols problems! FACT! They never have been, they've never solved anything and they NEVER WILL!"
Completely agree. Unfortunately BCC seem to have a thing about buses, especially ones provided by First.”