Wiltshire Local Plan and Melksham Bypass consultations - MRUG inputs

[whole diary]

[grahame]

How will our county and town look by 2036? Will we have a population up from 25,000 to 45,000?   Will we have a new bypass that bypasses the current bypass?  Will we have roads congested with electric cars, or an integrated public transport network with twigs reaching out into most streets?  Will we have a train service still every 2 hours - or will it have slipped back to twice a day or nothing at all - or will it be up to hourly, or twice an hour with alternate trains on Oxford - Swindon - Westbury - Salisbury Southampton and Bristol - Bath - Corsham - Melksham - Staverton - Bradford-on-Avon - Bath - Bristol?  Will the trains be electric? Will buses reach the station? Will the planet be stabalised in climate or burning up? Will we still be talking about a northern exit from the station? Will I be able to go out to the pub to celebrate my 82nd birthday, or will alcohol have been classified as a dangerous drug likely to incite dangerous behaviour and been driven underground? Will working from home be the norm?

My crystal ball is hazy, but I have been answering consultations with and on behalf of the Melksham Rail User Group on the Melksham Bypass and the Wiltshire Local Plan. Whether anyone takes any notice of our inputs or not (sometimes I wonder!) it they do provide a framework for thought onto which to help us clarify our own views, and if we are very lucky we may influence strategic documents which may oil the wheels of shorter term objectives.

Answer to the "A350 Melksham Bypass" consultation:
http://www.passenger.chat/mirror/mrug_bypass_input_20210116.pdf
1. We commend greener and public transport alternatives and mitigations
2. We request you consider wider alternatives such as improving the A36/A46 bottleneck
3. We request than any rail crossings allow for double track
4. We ask that any new build does not reduce access to the railway station
5. We request that data modelling is done with the latest data and projections not old ones
6. We request that new build does not interfere with the full restoration of the canal
7. We ask that steps be taken to route freight off the road onto rail
8. We ask opportunities be taken to improve cycling and walking routes and amenity access

Answer to the Wiltshire Local Plan:
http://www.passenger.chat/mirror/MRUGtoWCLP_20210308.pdf
1. Please ensure that new builds are located within easy walking distance of transport hubs
2. Please make new developments porous to allow easy walking and cycling
3. Please add public transport to walking and cycling as an area to invest in infrastructure
4. Please prioitise buses and bus facilities over even more parking at Melksham Station
5. Please provide for an improved welcoming environment for visitors to Melksham
6. Although we are a transport group, please provide plenty locally so people can travel less

Note that reductions of requests to soundbites may at times distort or blunt their meaning and it certainly removes the detail and cases!

These have been uploaded to the MRUG^» (Melksham Rail User Group - site) site and will also be covered at the meeting on 17th - all welcome via Zoom - code at http://www.passenger.chat/24600

[grahame]

Wiltshire Council have published the following:

https://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/media/6175/A350-Melksham-bypass-consultation-report/pdf/A350_Melksham_Bypass_Public_consultation_report_FINAL.pdf

https://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/media/6176/A350-Melksham-bypass-consultation-report-appendices/pdf/A350_Melksham_Bypass_Consultation_Appendices_FINAL.pdf

Good to see the Melksham Rail User Group quoted, and one or two of the ideas from that making it to the "we need to look at" summary.   Around 1000 responses in total, including one from TransWilts.  Luckily, it lines up with the MRUG^» (Melksham Rail User Group - site) input - as we sent them a draft copy of our input, and we all work towards the same overall objectives, that is only to be expected.

Threads on this getting a bit messy - use http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/search.html?search=A350&sortby=update to get you to the most recent threads and documents.

[Lee]

As someone who lived for 5 years in Batheaston (and thus understands the opposition to linking the A36/A46 there) and who has campaigned on TransWilts issues for years (and thus understands the opposition to the A350 assuming a "supertrunk" role), and who also now works on similar matters over here in France, I guess you could say I have many potential perspectives on this. I will probably address my take on actual solutions in a Transport Scholars post at some point after Ive first run my observations past grahame, Phil and others privately.

What I wanted to put across in this post though is how these results can be both a statistician's dream or a statistician's nightmare.

Do you, for example, take the apparent 60%-ish support for "the need for an improvement to the A350 at Beanacre and Melksham" as majority support for a road-based solution, or do you give appropriate weight to the fact that much of this is based on rail, bus, walking and cycling options. And do you consider support for rail, bus, walking and cycling options to be of note in its own right, or only as a supplementary approach to a road-based solution?

Ive recently done a lot of work in Saint Brieuc, and their approach is described as follows:

"Our territory is attractive, constantly evolving with new housing and new activities taking hold: The need for travel (whether on foot, by bicycle, by public transport or by car) is increasing. Air quality has been affected, with recent years, a deterioration which shows the need to change mobility practices.

Many objectives are to be achieved, including:

- Guaranteeing good accessibility for everyone and the safety of everyone when traveling;

- Preserve the environment and improve the living environment;

- Foster coherence between urbanization and travel offer.

The general objective of this project is not to demonize the car, but to ensure that the use of it is neither exclusive nor an obstacle to the practice of other modes of travel, such as is too often the case today. With its Urban Travel Plan, Saint-Brieuc Armor Agglomeration affirms the desire to move from a system where the automobile is dominant to a sustainable system which is part of a complementarity between the different modes of transport."

This is one of the closest fits I have ever seen with the ethos and philosophy we have evolved over the years from our involvement with Save The Train, through TransWilts Community Rail and continuing today with CoffeeShop and Melksham Rail Users/Transport Group.

If I could make one solid prediction from the bypass consultation report, it would be that Wiltshire Council's originally preferred route option 10c (long eastern bypass) seems to have both come through the process relatively unscathed with what looks like a genuine level of support, and the odds of that being the one they ultimately run with must now be significantly shorter.

Therefore the real prize is securing a positive vision for the Melksham and wider TransWilts corridor that is built within, around and beyond that, and that's the true opportunity that needs to be focused on.

[Lee]

And so it came to pass - As predicted, Wiltshire Council's originally preferred route option 10c (long eastern bypass) is being taking forward as part of the current engagement exercise, which ends on 8 August 2021 - see https://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/news/engagement-on-next-stage-of-proposed-melksham-bypass-begins-today

They have also produced a handy video so you can visualise the route of the bypass once it is completed:



2 immediate observations spring to mind:

- All the planned drainage ponds appear to be to the right-hand side of the bypass (ie the opposite side from where the current Melksham and Bowerhill housing is situated)

- It will be interesting to see how many people view the video, and end up visualising infill housing to the left hand side of the bypass, bringing the Melksham and Bowerhill urban area right up to the new road - And if they do, how many will view the prospect as Melksham's Bypass Opportunity, or as Melksham's Bypass Curse?

I must stress at this point that I have no strong views either way on this, and as grahame and others will testify, have come up with proposals for both scenarios.

If Melksham goes with the bypass and infill housing, then the reason that I cited Saint Brieuc in the previous post is that they are at the end of the trajectory that Melksham would be embarking on in that scenario, having started with roughly the same population level as Melksham has today and doubling it, becoming a genuine centre of regional importance in the process. What's more, following the "complementarity" approach, they have a top notch bus network, excellent active travel walking and cycling routes, a decent road network, and a railway station multimodal interchange with frequent regional services that came 2nd in France's most recent national "Best Station Awards"

As an example, I have drawn up a map of what an "Double Melksham's" Town Bus Network might look like if they followed a similar approach, modelled on Saint Brieuc's high-frequency colour-coded Chronotub network, see bottom of post.

The downside of course is that a lot of formerly "green" land was built over in the process.

If on the other hand, Melksham doesn't go for a bypass and infill housing approach, then they will still need to make significant improvements to their public transport and active travel networks just to properly cater for what they have now population and development-wise, with buses that will get you to medical facilities but not back again, dont run via the railway station or arent frequent or comprehensive enough to adequately serve recent housing developments, along with a cycle and walking route network that has potential, but falls short on delivery in a number of frustrating ways - not to mention a rail service that needs to move towards hourly all day, every day - all examples of what needs to be tackled and rectified, and we have plans that will fix all of that and provide more besides.

There is a wider context that needs to kept a close eye on as well. One fascinating aspect of all this is that in the original Melksham Bypass consultation, every Town and Parish Council who responded were prepared to at least accept a bypass if appropriate mitigation measures were put in place. By contrast, all 7 Parish Councils who would be affected by an A36/A46 link road will not accept one under any circumstances.

I suspect that such official attitudes do not go unnoticed by those who have influence over road trunking decisions. I would not be at all surprised if the building of a Melksham Bypass represented a tipping point in the A350 vs A36/A46 debate - perhaps something for both supporters and opponents of a Melksham Bypass to ponder and weigh up.

[grahame]

And so it came to pass - As predicted, Wiltshire Council's originally preferred route option 10c (long eastern bypass) is being taking forward as part of the current engagement exercise, which ends on 8 August 2021 - see https://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/news/engagement-on-next-stage-of-proposed-melksham-bypass-begins-today ....

An so it cometh to 8th August 2021, and the final day for inputs to this consultation.  As a Town Councillor these days, and one who takes an interest in future developments, I have been somewhat drawn in discussions (and people) rage and argue, and the scheme's promoters inform us from what I can't help feeling isn't the most independent of positions.   

My personal input has just been submitted at http://grahamellis.uk/ge_mbc_20210808.pdf ... which includes material which raises some very interesting side-shoots for the Coffee Shop if we run out of things to talk about.  But I need to head off and prepare for tomorrow night's council meeting at which this comes up (as a stakeholder, the council has a couple of days yet) and at which we also address the topic of the Melksham Assembly Hall - http://grahamellis.uk/blog216.html . August is a great month for running consultations and meetings on matters of controversy and hoping to slide them through - or am I just being a cynic?

[Lee]

I think I will content myself with referring my honourable friend to the answer I gave some weeks ago (my highlighting)  :

There is a wider context that needs to kept a close eye on as well. One fascinating aspect of all this is that in the original Melksham Bypass consultation, every Town and Parish Council who responded were prepared to at least accept a bypass if appropriate mitigation measures were put in place. By contrast, all 7 Parish Councils who would be affected by an A36/A46 link road will not accept one under any circumstances.

I will give grahame his due, Section 1.2 is a very bold and brave effort, but as ever, it just aint gonna happen, and the inclusion by him of a road link under the A36 at The Viaduct, Dundas, thus permanently removing the possibility of reusing the only remaining viable former rail trackbed corridor available for a Bath-Radstock/Shepton rail reopening, in his proposal does make me wonder whether it is actually one of his legendary tongue-in-cheek Devils Advocate pieces.

It's a shame because, again as ever, I agree with virtually everything else he has written in the document.

[grahame]

I will give grahame his due, Section 1.2 is a very bold and brave effort, but as ever, it just aint gonna happen, and the inclusion by him of a road link under the A36 at The Viaduct, Dundas, thus permanently removing the possibility of reusing the only remaining viable former rail trackbed corridor available for a Bath-Radstock/Shepton rail reopening, in his proposal does make me wonder whether it is actually one of his legendary tongue-in-cheek Devils Advocate pieces.

It's a shame because, again as ever, I agree with virtually everything else he has written in the document.

Classic case of putting too many words in and resulted in too specific an idea.  Four words removed from document ... now describes both the blue and red line options here.



The suggestion is, indeed, very much a long shot politically though, depending on how you balance the criteria, perhaps the best scientifically.