Letter: £4.2m for the London Road Cycle Lane is Absurd

Published on: 21 Jul, 2023
Updated on: 21 Jul, 2023

From: A retired SCC Highway Engineer and Burpham Resident (name and address supplied)

See: Better Cycling and Walking Around Schools

With about 19,000 vehicle movements a day, the cycle lane cost of £4.2 million to enable a “hoped-for increase of 50 per cent” over the existing 260 average cyclists (SCC figures) using London Road, Burpham each day is absurd. That’s £4.2 million to enable a hoped-for 130 extra cyclists to use London Road or £32,307 per cyclist!

The roadworks to install these cycle lanes will cause chaos in themselves. They will also cause pollution with road construction materials having to be dug and ground up not to mention all the fumes from the JCBs and pneumatic drills etc.

London Road is a main road access into Guildford from the A3. SCC as the highway authority seem to think nothing of the congestion that will be caused by narrowing this major “A” road by eliminating right turn lanes and so on.

The claim that cycling is widely used in Holland is irrelevant. The Dutch have a different outlook, different landscape and different roads. The government aim, to get walking and cycling increased to 50 per cent for all short journeys, is a nonsense. What study has been done to establish how many of the public are willing or even able, given their needs, to transfer to these modes of transport?

The vulnerability of cyclists will not be eliminated, there will always be conflict with motor vehicles. The lack of training and realisation of dangers seems not to be apparent to many cyclists with large number of them wearing black or dark clothing and having no lights. Observation of the Highway Code is also seriously lacking in many cases.

Cycling is also not the answer to some environmental claims with one cyclist on a normal single carriageway road able to slow down to crawling pace up 20 to 30 vehicles producing additional pollutants. In addition, this leads to dangerous overtakes by frustrated drivers – although admittedly, frustration should not be an excuse.

Mention is made of school children happily being able to reach school by cycling. Where are the facilities at schools to safely and securely park bicycles with numerous bike thefts taking place? Are parents or children going to be able maintain their machines and mend the inevitable punctures?

What will be the attraction of cycling in winter months with rain, snow and ice?

Money would be much better spent on subsidising buses, providing stations at Merrow and Park Barn/The Royal Surrey, funding reinstatement of the railway to Cranleigh and subsidising the purchase of electric cars.

By all means cycle if you want to but seeing cycling as the answer to all the environmental problems is rubbish.

The consultation by Surrey County Council has been appalling. There also seems to be a dictatorial band of officers and councillors hell-bent on seeing these cycle lanes instigated come hell or high water. I believe some are fervent environmentalists and have no recognition that normal life must go on, people and businesses cannot be dismissed by their philosophies.

I have to ask, with the council leader Tim Oliver admitting at the meeting at George Abbott School that it would be “madness” to carry on with it if there were “huge opposition” to the plans from the public, why the scheme is not just scrapped?

Why not improve the cycle tracks through Riverside Park from Bowers Lane to Stoke Lock and Stoke Park? Also, form a cycleway along the footpath from Burpham Lane along the back of the Weylea Farm and Abbotswood estates to the northern side of Stoke Park?

Responses to Letter: £4.2m for the London Road Cycle Lane is Absurd

Roger Carnegie Reply

July 21, 2023 at 3:57 pm

Our “retired SCC Highway Engineer and Burpham Resident” appears to be one of the reasons we are in this mess. If they have been responsible for the design and implementation in the past for the current mess of road infrastructure in Surrey they should be ashamed.

I must query the validity of the quoted numbers as the last Department of Transport traffic count shows only 14,000 vehicles using London Road not the exaggerated 19,000. The retiree has also chosen to understate the cycle count numbers, I presume to try and add weight to his argument.

Anyone who was a “highway engineer” – whatever that role actually involved – would be aware of these DoT traffic counts. For example, readers may be interested to note only eight articulated HGVs are recorded as using the Aldi – Boxgrove roundabout section per day.

Our anonymous engineer may not be familiar with current construction costs, for example, the £2.5 million recently spent on the Stoke Interchange Southbound slip road, which appeared to add nothing more than more queueing capacity.

I cannot support the agenda and campaign to increase the use of the already over capacity London Road by more HGVs and to make Burpham a rat run by drivers when the Stoke junction is more appropriate for drivers wishing to enter Guildford.

As I’ve said before, valid criticism is welcomed but an attack like this is not credible with the lazy stereotypical arguments and language used.
- Jeremy Holt Reply
  
  July 21, 2023 at 4:57 pm
  
  I was not surprised that the letter writer chose to be anonymous.
  
  Perhaps Roger Carnegie could be more specific on the source of his data and his credentials for passing comment.
  
  Also, I do not understand how it more sensible for drivers on the A3 coming to Guildford from London to use Stoke Interchange rather than London Road.
Wayne Smith Reply

July 21, 2023 at 4:14 pm

The £4.2 million cost is absurd but from the meeting at George Abbot school, it was quite apparent that SCC doesn’t consider it its money (but showed no recognition that it still comes from taxpayers). They made it quite plain that if they don’t proceed they will have to pay back the government grant and may never receive another grant because of their failure.

It’s quite predictable what the outcome of any further consultation will be.
Ben Paton Reply

July 21, 2023 at 7:24 pm

A breath of fresh air. That dose of common sense needed to be said.

Carving cycle lanes out of an existing A road is just counterproductive. Build cycle lanes. But build them where cyclists don’t have to compete with cars and lorries.
Retired Highways Engineer Reply

July 22, 2023 at 12:10 pm

The c.19,000 vehicle figure is taken from the 18,793 for ALL vehicles as quoted from the DfT Census 2017 (follow link below).
https://guildford-dragon.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screenshot-2023-07-22-at-12.03.52.png

The cycle number count was taken from figures quoted by SCC at the January meeting at George Abbot School. In the 2017 count there were only 68 cyclists.

Mr Carnegie says he cannot support an “agenda and campaign to increase the use of the already over capacity London Road by more HGVs”. Nobody is advocating that, what is being said is the narrowing will cause congestion to the existing traffic use. London Road is an existing access road into north-east Guildford from the A3.

See: https://roadtrafficstats.uk/traffic-statistics-surrey-a3100-17735

(Name and address supplied)
- Roger Carnegie Reply
  
  July 22, 2023 at 4:38 pm
  
  It is curious that 2017 data has been chosen, and from an obscure website. More recent traffic counts are available directly from the Dept of Transport (https://roadtraffic.dft.gov.uk/). The year of 2017 is the highest traffic volume, and lowest bicycle count for 20 years, and is also an estimate.
  
  All of this would be known to even the most junior traffic engineer, which is why I raised the objection.
  
  Readers may be familiar with these traffic counts when they see people in camping chairs sitting at the roadside with clipboards noting the vehicles passing.
  
  In my day an engineer was a man of precision and facts and sadly these standards do appear to be slipping.
  - Retired Highways Engineer Reply
    
    July 23, 2023 at 4:38 pm
    
    The source quoted by Mr Carnegie in his reply is from the same source as quoted by myself. The 269-cyclist figure from 2018 was the last manual count carried out, (with more recent counts being estimated), but near the figure quoted at the meeting by SCC.
    
    The 2017 vehicle count of 18,739 was pre-Covid and represents a realistic maximum level which might be expected and planned for. The maximum vehicle figures for the years 2014/15/16/17 were all over 18,000. Planning isn’t carried out using the minimum figure. The trend shown in the statistics is for increasing numbers of vehicles using London Road.
Jeremy Holt Reply

July 22, 2023 at 7:19 pm

I wrote an earlier comment about Roger Carnegie’s first comment saying “I was not surprised that the letter writer chose to be anonymous when I read the bile and innuendo in this comment”.

The editor chose to omit the second half of the sentence.

Roger Carnegie’s second comment again contains bile and innuendo.

It is a pity that the editor has allowed this to continue.

Editor’s response: Several comments in this trail have been moderated with parts removed. I considered “bile an innuendo” to be and exaggeration and inaccurate. My judgement was that those that remained were milder and tolerable. Others can make their own judgements but it is an opportunity to remind all those submitting comments of our policy which can be seen here.
Valerie Thompson Reply

July 25, 2023 at 3:50 pm

With the many problems affecting local authority budgets in Surrey at the moment, the idea of spending this ridiculous amount of money on cycleways, which will inconvenience the public for months during construction, and forever after when attempting to access Guildford on this essential road, is total madness.
Sara Tokunaga Reply

July 26, 2023 at 6:54 am

I was surprised to see that Mr Carnegie’s comments were not moderated by the editor as they appeared to be a blatant attack on the unknown writer’s integrity. When Mr Holt responded his comments were moderated. It would seem the editor is practising double standards on this occasion.

I totally agree with the unknown writer’s comments and consider Mr Carnegie’s comments to be rude. Is he, perhaps, hoping to become a GBC councillor as this kind of sniping seems to be required for such a position?

Editor’s response: Mr Carnegie’s comments were also moderated.