MP's pledge over BRT inquiry
Bath MP Don Foster says he is determined to ensure that people affected by controversial council transport plans get the chance to have their say at a public inquiry.
The future of Bath and North East Somerset Council's bus rapid transit route (BRT) through Newbridge now hangs on the inquiry into its attempt to compulsorily purchase nearly 60 parcels of land.
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The hearing into the compulsory purchase orders (CPO) is expected to cost £1.2 million and is now unlikely to go ahead until the middle of the summer.
This is on top of what is now an overall expected cost of £62.7 million to implement all of the Bath Transportation Package (BTP), which the council is still confident will be provided through Government funding despite the uncertainty of a post-election public spending squeeze.
The cost has risen from a previous total of £57.5 million.
Campaigners opposed to the BTP are angry that B&NES has classed many of them as non-statutory objectors on official documents relating to the inquiry.
The law states that anyone affected by land being bought, including those whose property could lose value because of a new scheme, should be named as statutory objectors and have an automatic right to speak at such an inquiry.
However B&NES has decided to limit the definition to those who have actually been issued with a CPO.
Mr Foster said the inspector appointed to take charge of the inquiry would have the right to determine who spoke at it.
"I would expect all residents affected by the scheme, who have submitted objections, to be allowed to speak, not just those who have land subject to a CPO.
"When the date for the inquiry is set I will get in touch with the inspector to confirm that many of those that the council has deemed to be non-statutory objectors will be permitted to speak.
"Residents are rightly upset about the council's poor consultation on the proposed BTP, and it is vitally important that the public inquiry is conducted in an open and transparent fashion, and local residents should have the chance to air their views."
Meanwhile, the Government Office of the North East, which is handling the run-up to the public inquiry for the Department for Transport, has said it will probably be delayed for another six months.
The inquiry, which is looking at four orders affecting 59 parcels of land, has been pencilled in for early August and is due to last two weeks.
Most of the land is earmarked for the BRT, but there are other plots needed for the expansion of Newbridge Park and Ride and in connection with the proposed Bathampton Park and Ride site.
Helen Samuels, from the campaign group Newbridge Matters!, said: "A number of residents who will be detrimentally affected by the planned extension to the Newbridge Park and Ride and other elements of the BTP are concerned that, although they clearly fall into the statutory objector category as laid out in the Government guidelines and confirmed by lawyers and other professionals with experience in these matters, they have received information from B&NES Council listing them as non-statutory objectors.
"As the public inquiry is an independent procedure, we are mystified that this has been left to B&NES to decide, as it effectively jeopardises the neutrality of the underlying platform."
A spokesman for the council denied that it had not consulted properly on the scheme and said it stuck by its decision on statutory objectors.
He said: "Consultation with the local community has been extensive, going back as far as 1997 when the Bath Local Plan stated that the council would consider safeguarding the BRT route for provision of a rapid transit link.
"In the council's view these statutory objectors are having their land, interests, or rights affected or acquired by the council.
"Anyone not included in the CPO is not a statutory objector because the council considers them not to fall into these categories."
The spokesman added that the council hoped the public inquiry would be held in an "open and transparent" way and that residents would have a fair chance to give their views.
29 Comments
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by Nick D, Bath
Tuesday, March 16 2010, 10:53AM
“Graeme, reading your last posting I wonder if you aren't making any effort to understand others' viewpoints, or being deliberately obtuse in "debating" the issues raised?
At no point did I ask for alternative ideas to the BRT and to suggest I did amounts to more misdirection. If it's that you simply misread, read it again and you'll see the comment: "I'd be interested to hear in an alternative argument any tangible benefits the BTP might bring..." makes your response obtuse. Whether it's deliberate or not, and used as justification for ignoring the points I made, is something you might want to clarify.
Your reply to my comments about the 2004 Report indicates that both the above might apply and you've made it clear that whether I imagined the report or not is irrelevant to you. Without writing an essay myself I'll only reassure you it's real enough.
I mentioned one of a number of reasons B&NES shouldn't have proceeded but then, having already obtained permission to develop Lambridge in 2006 (which is the plan Lib Dems supported), the council decided not to go ahead with this scheme as it appeared in the Business Case, instead changing the P&R site to Bathampton Meadows in 2007/8 without any consultation whatsoever.
This change was 'authorised' in secret and not through any official written or recorded correspondence between B&NES and the DfT (funding authority) that might be accessed via future FOI Act requests as one might expect from public servants.
What your comments have revealed is that you're either misinformed or fail to recognise such serious issues surrounding the pursuit of the BTP, its funding and associated CPOs.
For example, given the fact that the segregated section of the BRT route is only 17% of the total and will do nothing to traffic in an area which suffers little congestion in comparison with much of Bath, it's a clear misdirection to consistently call the BRT a "segregated route" without this qualification.
You say: "Clearly we need a meaningful solution... Why have BANES pushed for this scheme?" This is the effectively the same question I and others are asking and it has never been answered satisfactorily, least of all by the Council's own data showing the BTP provides no sustainable improvement to congestion and pollution levels, thus failing in its primary objective.”
by Dave, Larkhall
Saturday, March 13 2010, 8:50PM
“Unlike you I know very little about traffic computer models, SATURN, or Mott McDonalds, and am truly grateful to take heed of your knowledge.
Graeme, I presume like me you have read through the "Core Strategy". Below is an extract from a posting I made some months ago:
"In the document, over 75 per cent of the content appeared to be aspirations, backed up only by forward projected statistics, whilst the remaining quarter or so would appear to have a certain ring of 'decision already made' about it.
This latter element includes:
Bath population ¿ increase of 17,000 by the year 2026
If the good citizens of Bath got cracking immediately, even with overtime, 17,000 by 2026??? So where are all these new folk coming from?
Bath to have 11-12,000 new houses by the year 2026.
But who are these new houses for, and at what price? It's certainly not for the natural, local population growth, and as they will inevitably be built by private developers, not affordable for locals either.
45,0000 square metres of extra shopping."
If we now consider that 2 or 3 thousand MOD jobs are likely to go to Filton, then add on what will probably be the largest cut backs in public sector spending after 6th May that I have ever seen in my nearly seventy years on this earth. Take account of the largest national debt we have had since World War 2, the inevitable rise in mass unemployment, the real immigration statistics (if they ever get released) and the subsequent surge in benefit payouts, I think your suggestion to all meet in the pub is the first sensible thing to come out of this debate.
We won't need a BRT and destruction of beautiful green fields. It's tanks and helmets we'll need for the revolution.”
by Stevo, Bath
Saturday, March 13 2010, 6:01PM
“Graeme
Rather than debating this in a pub I'd like to see a full and independent publi inquiry :)”
by donut, Weston
Friday, March 12 2010, 10:34PM
“Graeme
"while sacrificing a few votes in Newbridge."
They are not worried by losing votes in Newbridge or anywhere else in Bath. What few seats they have in Bath are mainly safe seats. The council is run and supported by NES (ex Wansdyke) councillors, and Bath councillors have very little say. The planning committee has a Bath Cons councillor who was presumably deemed flaky so he was substituted at the vital meetings, even though not officially removed from the committee.
It is this arrogance that inflames us 'moaners'.
I”
by Graeme, Bath
Friday, March 12 2010, 6:48PM
“The problem with this format is how pithy comment is more easily absorbed than reasoned debate of all points in an issue. Maybe we should all just meet in a pub and talk this through over a beer or two. It would save me writing essays.
Nick - Assuming that you¿ve imagined this negative BANES report to which you refer but won¿t reference, I¿ll ignore it and address your comment about alternatives to BRT. For example on their well-read blog page (1000 hits so far, woo), Veracity Bath suggest a Tram. I¿m sure they engaged some competent transport consultant to take them through that proposal ¿ or maybe they just made it up in the pub.
If I lived next to an airport and they extended the runway, what would qualify me to comment on the extension? Sure I¿d have an uninformed and heavily biased opinion but it would be of little value except to acknowledge the impact and consider mitigations. I¿m deeply suspicious of some BRT objectors on this basis, including VCB.
The BRT is on a brownfield, existing transport corridor for some of the route. Traffic in Bath is generally pretty bad already. Clearly we need a meaningful solution otherwise it will get worse as more people commute into the city. Why have BANES pushed for this scheme?
I actually bothered to read the technical reports on why the BRT was considered to be of positive benefit by the experts involved. I talked to some transport consultants about how they work out schemes like this. Its clear that the DfT lay down clear methods of traffic survey and modelling to work out if spending £60M is worth it or not. Random statements of ¿I live in Newbridge and it takes me 5 minutes to get to town¿ are anecdote. The SATURN transport modelling mandated by the DfT is engineering.
Perhaps what impresses me most about the tories (btw I¿m not a tory voter) is their willingness to push this scheme through in the face of such opposition. Turkeys don¿t vote for Christmas, do they? Yet they are pushing it through. I want my elected representatives to do the difficult, long-term things, not just the short-term populist rubbish to keep themselves in power. From what I can see, Don Foster and the Lib Dems (who commissioned the scheme studies and supported the BTP until they lost control of BANES) are the populists, and the tories look like the guys trying to do the long term good for all of Bath, while sacrificing a few votes in Newbridge.”