Issue - meetings

To welcome Bob Menzies, (Service Director, Strategy & Development) & Ashley Heller (Team Leader) from Cambridgeshire County Council.

A presentation will be given on the Cambourne to Cambridge Bus Priority Proposals.  

The Chair welcomed Ashley Heller, Team Leader, Transport Projects, Cambridgeshire County Council who gave a presentation on the Cambourne to Cambridge Bus Priority Proposals, advising the consultation had now finished.

Mr Heller described the route into Cambridge down Madingley Road as ‘unreliable’ and advised with further economic development the unreliability would increase. The modelling data showed that there was significant congestion starting at Madingley Mulch, which would get worse if nothing was done. The Park & Ride will encourage car drivers to access the City in buses and help to reduce the congestion along the route.

The Committee were then shown the six options that had been put forward for consultation and the business case explained.

Comments from the Committee:

     i.        Specified that the environmental impact of the scheme had been ignored.

    ii.        Stated that the proposals could not be described as visionary.

   iii.        Proposal should be put forward with solutions; it was not good enough to say that any scheme taken forward would need to be mitigated.

  iv.        Disappointed that there had been no feedback from the consultation given at the meeting.

   v.        Public engagement was important and further engagement should be encouraged when looking at the preferred schemes.

  vi.        Important to look at the way that ideas were presented to the public and have a design that people could be inspired by.

 vii.        Enquired if the bus lane shown on some of the proposals were for a guided bus or a standard bus.

viii.        Questioned if there were any consideration of a small shuttle bus service.

  ix.        Asked what form of energy the buses would be using.

In response to comments from the public and the Committee the Team Leader, Transport Projects, responded with the following:

     i.        The project was very early in the process in engagement with the public and would be developed.

    ii.        Further technical work would then be undertaken derived from the consultation and reported back to the City Deal in September followed by further public consultation.

   iii.        Confirmed that if alternative modes of transports were put forward for consideration this would be looked at but had to be realistic in what could be delivered

  iv.        Advised that due to the size of the City and the fairly low density of population this had to be taken into account and a bus way system would be the most efficient.

   v.        Buses were seen as the way forward to cut congestion in the City, fewer vehicles would reduce traffic pollution.

  vi.        To use smaller shuttle buses would mean an increase in the number of buses of that size to bring people into the City.

 vii.        The first fully electric double-decker bus would be soon be in service to trial in London as transport authorities try to reduce the capital’s air pollution levels which was being looked at with interest.

8. Stage Coach had bid for Government funding as part of its plan to overhaul its existing double decker fleet with new low-emission, hybrid buses which would see a reduction in emissions.
9. Cambridgeshire County Officers had looked at the electric buses which commenced operations in Milton Keynes in 2014. These were part of a pilot project supported by the UK Department of Transport assessing the viability of electricity powered vehicles in public transport.

Councillor Cantrill thanked Ashely Heller for his time and looked forward to the results of the first phase public consultation.