Consultation on Cross City Bus: Longbridge – Hamstead

Filed under: Consultation

We are in favour of improving the reliability of bus services as a means of enticing more people out of their cars and onto buses.

We would also love to see more holistic schemes developed. We believe that the quickest and cheapest way to improve the reliability of the bus network is to build a protected cycle network. We think that this would provide the biggest amount of mode shift in the shortest period of time. This would significantly reduce congestion on the roads, which ultimately is what will produce the biggest improvement in bus reliability.

Whilst we have issues with this scheme and believe that it could be significantly improved, we would like our response to be considered to be in favour of the scheme.

Kings Norton

A bus lane on the A441 in Kings Norton is a sensible move, though we would question why it isn’t one continuous lane from Kings Norton Park all the way up to the bus stops just past the entrance to Kings Norton train station car park. Given the constraint on road capacity that the proposed sections of bus lane will create, there seems little benefit to having these breaks in the bus lane.

Cotteridge

Whilst there is nothing wrong with the proposed changes, we wonder if replacing the two roundabouts with traffic lights that governed the whole junction would deliver more benefits for bus reliability? By having single-direction green phases, combined with prioritising the lights for buses, you could have a bus lane all the way up to the southern-most junction. The traffic lights on the bus lane could even go green ahead of general traffic, allowing it to reach the right turn at the junction with Watford Road first. Similarly, you could have a bus lane on the southbound Pershore Road approaching the Watford Road junction.

Stirchley

A bus lane on city-bound Hazelwell Street will help, though we see no reason for it not to be applicable 24 hours a day. If it is felt that a bus lane is not required outside of rush hour, then it stands to reason that there is no need for that lane to be available for general traffic. However, we feel that with the ever-increasing number of cars on our roads, traffic build-ups frequently occur outside of the traditional rush hour (afternoon school runs also being particularly bad for generating traffic), so making it 24/7 will provide greater benefit to the reliability of the bus route.. Furthermore, making bus lanes apply 24/7 removes drivers from having to think about whether they are allowed to drive in them, increasing compliance.

The proposal to remove parking spaces from Pershore Road near Cartland Road is a sensible move. We are of the opinion that extending the right-turn lane to allow for longer queues will not bring much benefit, as we suspect that traffic already regularly queues there currently. Furthermore, even if there is some initial improvement, the law of induced demand will quickly result in more vehicles using the lane, returning congestion back to current levels before long. We would again ask if it would not be better to make the traffic lights single-direction green phased only. This would remove the need for a right-turn lane into Cartland Road, allowing a bus lane to take the place of the current city-bound lane.

We have serious reservations about the proposal to remodel the junctions with Warwards Lane and St Stephens Road. We agree that the junctions need improving, but we do not believe that the proposed design will achieve that. Our main issue is that in rush hour, traffic backs up from the junction with Cartland Road and can extend past the Dogpool Lane junction. This will cause serious delays to the 76 bus whilst providing no benefit to the 45/47.

Our preference would be for the junction to be traffic-light controlled, with St Stephens becoming one-way from Pershore Road. We feel this is the only way that a protected cycle lane could run between this junction and Cartland Road. Then a section of Warwards Lane could be made one-way from St Stephens to Pershore Road. This may require a modal filter on Ribblesdale Road to make remodeling that junction easier, though there would be plenty of space available from the unneeded lane on Warwards to provide space for vehicles to turn.

We have been told in online meetings about this scheme that it is felt that traffic lights at the junction would introduce delays to 45/47 buses. However, we would argue that it will make no difference during rush hour, as it is traffic backing up from the Cartland Road junction that blocks this junction during rush hour., and could possibly even help, if green waves were implemented for the lights here and at Cartland Road. We are also concerned that during rush hour, it is only the fact that traffic is stationary around the junction that allows vehicles to exit Dogpool Lane (especially turning right onto Pershore Road). Without this, we fear congestion on Dogpool Lane will severely increase, significantly impacting the 76 bus route.

We are happy with the proposal for modal filters on Hobson and Kitchener Roads, a proposal that we assisted the local residents association to formulate after much consultation with residents. We would note that the Kings Heath and Moseley Places for People scheme suggests that removable bollards will be regularly stolen or taken out, leading to widespread abuse of the modal filters. We suggest either coffin bollards or permanent immovable ones (our understanding is that the emergency services haven’t been historically interested in removable bollards, preferring instead to update their routing software to avoid them.

Area around Edgbaston Cricket Ground

We agree with reducing the amount of parking on Pershore Road on the section towards  Pebble Mill Road. We would argue that there should ultimately be no parking on that section of the road, and would suggest a paid parking permit scheme for residents.

We have mixed feelings about the bus lane proposed for this section. As this section of road is only wide enough for either a bus lane or a protected cycle lane, our preference would be for a cycle lane. Our argument is that providing a comprehensive protected cycle lane is the quickest and cheapest way to achieve mode shift and reduce congestion. This would improve the reliability of buses.

However, if a bus lane is to be installed here, we again would want it to be 24/7.

We note that the pedestrian lights currently have an overly long wait time to change for pedestrians, and would ask that this be looked at improving.

We again would like to see the bus lane operational 24/7.

The bus lane proposed for the section of Pershore Road between Priory Road to Aboyne Close looks good (and is operational 24/7, we note).

We’re disappointed to see the bus lane leading to the Middleway not be 24/7.

We would have liked to have seen a modal filter on Balsall Heath Road, as this is a popular rat run. This would possibly reduce the amount of vehicles on that stretch of Pershore Road.

Willows Road

We agree that Willows Road is an incredibly difficult road for the 35 to use. We are happy to see the proposed removal of a bus stop, something that we think should be done across the whole network (building on the work TfWM did with Tom Forth in 2017). Whilst we agree that the amount of parking on the road is a major cause of delays on the route, as we believe it to be residents parking, we find it difficult to see how it would be possible to remove half the parking in the short-term.

It may be easier to get buy-in from the residents for a bus gate at the Edgbaston Road end of Willows Road. Furthermore, we feel this would improve the ability of the 35 to move along Willows Road significantly more than the proposed parking restrictions.

Brandwood Park Road

We are always happy to see parking restrictions put in place. Ultimately, until people have to consider where they will store their car, we will not stop the ever-increasing amount of cars on our road. We would like to see a residents parking permit scheme for the proposed bays here.

We would, however, also like to see a bus gate on Brandwood Park Road. We believe this would improve the reliability of the 35, due to significantly reducing the amount of traffic at the junction with Brandwood Road. We believe that it would also significantly reduce the amount of traffic using Broad Lane as a rat run. We contend that this would improve the reliability of both the 27 and 50 bus routes due to less cars queueing on the A435 to turn into Broad Lane.

Vicarage Road

Again, the proposed parking restrictions are to be welcomed. We would note, however, that there is a lack of enforcement of existing parking restrictions on that road (particularly where the shops are).

We see no need for the proposed parking bay alongside Kings Heath Park. The park already has two car parks that people can use if they have to drive to the park.

We are similarly concerned at the proposal for parking bays between Highbury Road and the High Street. As a significant number of the houses on that section of road have off-road parking, we see no need to provide additional on-street parking. We would ask how much on-street parking is non-residential.

We do believe that this space would be better utilised as a protected cycle lane, particularly with the number of schools in the area.

We would also suggest removing the bus stop by All Saints Square. There is a stop for the 35 50 meters round the corner on the city-bound side of the High Street, and one for the 11, 27, and 76 50 meters round the corner on the southbound side of the High Street. The closeness of the bus stops on both sides of Vicarage Road regularly blocks the entire road.

We are also concerned that the proposed bus lane for right turns onto the High Street seems to contradict Phase 2 of the Places for People scheme, which is proposing to allow right turns for all vehicles. We would probably prefer to see the proposed camera-enforced bus lane, but want to flag this.

Newtown

Again, removing parking is something we approve of, and improving the safety of a junction by signalising it are both suggestions we approve of.

Witton Road

The proposed change to the Witton Road roundabout seems sensible. We do wonder if the slip road could benefit from being changed to be a bus lane?

We appreciate the continuous footway across Manor Road, something we’d love to see rolled out across the whole city.

Again, we approve of removing unnecessary bus stops on the route.

Whilst we accept the high level of residents parking on the section of Witton Road by Malthouse Croft, we suggest that introducing a residents parking permit scheme would stop an increase in the number of cars parking on that section, and could be used to eventually reduce numbers.

Hamstead Road

Once more, we approve of the removal of parking on this section of the scheme. We also like the reduction in the width of Priestly Close, we’d have liked to see a continuous footway added to it.

Moving the northbound bus stop to improve pedestrian safety is a welcome move.

We would question how effective painting Keep Clear on the roundabout will be.

Hamstead

The signalisation of the Hamstead Road and Old Walsall Road junction seems sensible, as does moving the two pedestrian crossings to this junction.

We’re generally not fans of adding in right-turn lanes, but this one seems particularly unnecessary, as there are two entrances to the parking.

At the junction with Rocky Lane, we again wonder if the traffic lights could not change to single-direction green phasing, allowing the conversion of the left-hand lane on Old Walsall Road and the left turn lane on Rocky Lane to bus lanes. We are happy to see pedestrian crossings added to the junction.

Conclusion

As we stated at the beginning, we would like our response to be considered in favour of this scheme, though we do hope the concerns we raise about both this specific scheme, as well as wanting to see more holistic schemes that take the bigger picture view of improving bus services by reducing congestion, be taken into account.