This week's Hunts Post reveals that the busway is delaying transport of construction materials from Marshalls in St Ives to the Olympic Games site in London - 30 HGVs of materials per day, and, of course, 30 return trips empty.
Chris Annis of Marshalls claims this is due to the traffic lights where the busway crosses Harrison Way, plus cars parking in Meadow Lane. The lights are also causing delays back to the Manchester Arms. Bob Menzies of Cambridgeshire County Council does not believe the lights are causing these delays, and says that the Council has no record of Marshalls having complained about this matter.
(Hunts Post, 9 November, page 8)
Of course, if the railway had been retained, then this material could potentially have been transported by rail.
Whilst it is great that there is now an enhanced bus service between St Ives and Cambridge via the busway, it seems that the busway itself offers rather marginal benefits. If the journey times are often slower than via the A14 and a revived train service would have been faster still could not the same benefits have been achieved by retaining the railway, possibly reconnecting it to Huntingdon, and then co-ordinating a series of feed-in services from outlying towns and villages? Not only might this have been cheaper, but it would have retained the flexibility for freight traffic, as this Marshalls story so clearly illustrates.
ReplyDeleteOlympics will bring lots of traffic this year to London. I think they all should plan up for Avoiding Olympic Travel Delays. Thought I'd share!
ReplyDeleteThanks for posting this link. Fortunately St Ives is far enough for any Olympic venue to avoid most Olympic traffic delays. But the A14, which the Busway is intended to bypass, is a main road route to/from London via the M11, and could see a build up of traffic during the Olympics. Unless, of course, people leave their cars at home and travel by train.
ReplyDeleteThe Olympic Torch will be passing through St Ives in early July, and this will bring a welcome influx of visitors to the town, and that should benefit our local businesses.