We Asked, You Said, We Did

We Asked

Between 9 May 2022 and 8 June 2022 Bristol City Council conducted an engagement survey asking about the proposals to carry out highway improvements focusing on a drainage system and footpath improvements along Whiteladies Road between the Tyndall’s Park Road junction and the Queen’s Road junction. We need to address the issues of flooding and footpath space for pedestrians on the inbound route and proposed to:

• Remove the inbound cycle lane to provide space to accommodate a wider, flat and even footpath whilst retaining the inbound traffic lane for motorised traffic.
• Replace the existing footpath with permeable soft verges (grass verges) which will take rainfall from the surface and help alleviate the risk of localised flooding.
• Install a new drainage channel for the water to flow between the new footpath and the permeable soft verges (grass verges) to take rainfall and direct it to the grass.
• Retain the existing drain covers to help drain the footpath and reduce risk of localised flooding.
• Create new drainage from the road to include kerbs with drainage holes to improve the water flow into the drains and reduce blockages from leaves.
• Retain existing vehicle access to properties.

For the outbound footpath (heading away from the Triangle) we proposed to:

• Replace the existing high kerbs with drop kerbs.
• Remove the outbound cycle lane and reduce the outbound traffic lane to 3.6m to give pedestrians on the narrow footway more space from traffic.

You Said

A total of 1,016 completed responses were received from the survey. The headline findings are:

• Of the flood alleviation proposals:
  • 75% thought the permeable soft verges were fair to very good
  • 84% rated the new drainage channel from fair to very good
  • 90% rated the kerbs with holes to aid water flow to drains from fair to very good
• Of the pedestrian measure proposals:
  • 72% rated the wider and flat inbound footpath fair to very good
  • 80% rated the dropped kerbs on the outbound footpath as fair to very good
• Of the road layout proposals:
  • 94% rated the removal of the cycle lanes as poor to very poor
  • 73% rated the narrowing of traffic lanes as fair to very good

We also had response from 5 stakeholders who were the Bristol Cycling Campaign, Bristol Walking Alliance, University of Bristol, Cycling UK and University of Bristol Cycling Club. Comments from each of these groups were that they objected to the removal of the cycle lanes.

You can read the full report here.

We did

In response to the engagement feedback the team have reviewed the proposals and have agreed to look at retaining the cycle lanes and are currently looking at alternatives to help with the flooding and footpath issues. More information will be available on the new proposals once these have been worked through.