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Oxford Road, Manchester (CC licensed by Pete Birkinshaw via Flickr).jpgBus lanes are making travel slower for ‘everybody’ says Manchester MP
A Manchester MP says that bus lanes should be opened to cars until the Mancunian Way is fixed. Graham Stringer says that bus lanes are making travel times slower for ‘everybody’ and also wants to see a full review of whether they should be used at all.
Manchester is currently experiencing road works in a number of locations, including major changes on Portland Street as part of the bus priority scheme. The sinkhole that opened up on the Mancunian Way has been causing significant disruption in particular with a major tunnelling project underway to build a new sewer.
Video: Driver in Whalley Range "swerves to avoid cyclist" – what do you think?
Stringer, the MP for Blackley and Broughton, told the Manchester Evening News that bus lanes were ‘a money-making racket’.
“I think we should suspend bus lanes until Mancunian Way is sorted out – and do an objective report on bus lanes. Evidence so far is that bus lanes are damaging the economy and making travel times slower for everybody.
“We need to look at whether they are an ideological decision only good for profits and not for the travelling public. It’s a money-making racket and the transport authority rather arrogantly says they will have to educate motorists. In my view, the transport authority needs educating on how to run a public transport system.
“Bus lanes are causing havoc and congestion not just in the city centre but all over Manchester. Is it responsible to spend such large quantities of public money without any external assessment of their effectiveness?”
Clearly not of a mind to temper his opinions when speaking to the press, Stringer went on to accuse Transport for Greater Manchester of ‘vandalising the economy and our transport system’.
A spokesman for TfGM was quick to point out that almost a third of Greater Manchester’s population doesn’t have a car.
“Buses are able to carry a significantly higher number of passengers and therefore maximise the efficient use of road space to and from the city centre. A bus occupies the same amount of highway as two or three cars but is able to carry up to 70 passengers.”
Councillor Kate Chappell, executive member for the environment, said that nearly two thirds of commuters travelled into the city centre on public transport and suspending bus lanes would therefore have a significant detrimental effect on a large number of people.
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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Manchester now is where London was about 10-15 years ago. Clogged solid by traffic casued by a mixture of an infrastructure system that simply can't cope, decades of poor city planning and design, self-entitled/ignorant motorists who absolutely refuse to consider any alternative even when they are sitting there for an hour to do 4 miles.
Manchester regularly tops the poll of all car-related crime (the highest number of speeding convictions, uninsured drivers, drivers on most licence points etc).
They tried to introduce a congestion charge system a while ago and the NO brigade got straight in there with all manner of dire end-of-days secenarios, it got voted down so all of Manchester just had their council tax increased to pay for the new tram network.
Compared with most other Northern cities, the public transport is actually pretty good - two mainline train stations, lots of buses, a very good tram network. Compared with London though, it's woeful. It urgently needs an Oyster card system and a significant price drop.
And the cycle "infrastructure" - ha, the less said about that the better, it's atrocious.
Interestingly I voted no to the Congestion Charge, simply because the campaign for/against weren't very good and I didn't understand how it would impact me. I blame the politicans for not explaining things.
The public transport in Manchester Id say is very good, the problem at the moment is general congestion causing them to be late. Or, drivers driving on the tram tracks (which is a weekly things right now).
I now live in London, a lot of places in the UK need to learn what works here, congestion charge works (to an extent), public transport works and the cycling infrastructure is on the way up (not great, but the best ive seen in the UK).
I have several friends who travel 5 miles into the city centre - they all live next to train stations, they all can use public transport they chose not to because they like there car - I call it lazy.
There needs to be more carrot before a stick like a congestion charge is applied. London has pretty good public transport, but the rest of the UK doesn't. We need to seriously try enticing the majority of the travelling public out of their comfy, warm metal boxes first, as opposed to beating them up for not choosing one of the shitty alternatives they're presented with.
When I'm not cycling, I commute in and out of Manchester by train. It's expensive, unreliable and overcrowded. It makes me want to cycle in, which I do as often as is feasible. But for the vast majority of people, it will make them want to drive, and I can't honestly blame them when the train is such a shit option.
It really annoys me when an MP comes out with stupid comments like this.
Simply, promote the use of public transport, car sharing and bicycles - don't give people more of an excuse to drive. The roads in Manchester are terrible, partly due to the amount of cars travelling.
Presented without comment (from Wikipedia):
I like this logic. In any country that has done a study, it is found that using cars is bad for the economy and makes journey times longer for everyone. Maybe they should be scrapped.
Without bus lanes there would be no incentive for people to use them instead of cars. Number of cars on the road would go up and journey times for EVERYBODY would increase. So it seams the MP is bad for the economy and trying to increase journey times for everybody. So he should be scrapped too.
Not all bus lanes are great, and there may be circumstances where even good ones should be temporarily suspended. But having been in a number of transport meetings where Mr Stringer was a participant, it has been clear to me that he doesn’t need evidence to know what’s right...
What a C*ck!
Does the guy have an argument as to why bus lanes make travel slower for bus passengers (and cyclists, and pedestrians)?
Because, otherwise, the logical inference here is that this MP simply doesn't regard those who travel by public transport (or walk) as people. By "Everybody" he seems to mean "car users".
For him, then, nobody else exists (and as they don't exist, clearly they won't be able to vote for him, something I hope they bear in mind if they manage to make it to the polling stations, despite their phantasmagorical status).