Fury and caution on bus gates

While Glasgow transport bosses have welcomed the idea to put bus gates in Renfield Street and Oswald Street, businesses are cautious and members of the public have reacted with fury.

Evening Times reader James Creaney, voiced the opinion of many people when he said: "Driving and parking in Glasgow is a flipping nightmare.

"The place is full of bus gates and no right turns. And 60p to park on the street for 12 minutes? They must be raking it in."

Glasgow City Council wants to introduce the bus gates in a bid to ease congestion and speed up the flow of public transport.

A similar controversial move in Nelson Mandela Place resulted in hundreds of drivers falling foul of the new rules which allow only buses and taxis to use the route.

It is estimated the new measures, which are part of a city centre transport strategy, could result in traffic travelling through the heart of the city falling by around 9%.

Glasgow Chamber of Commerce chief executive Stuart Patrick said he had concerns about car owners being discouraged from driving through the city centre.

He said: "We welcome the economic vibrancy of the city centre being ident-ified as a key objective and the recognition of the transport strategy as important to the success of the wider city centre strategy."

Mr Patrick said he also welcomed moves to improve signs identifying car parks and to further develop park-and-ride schemes.

He added: "However we have concerns on moves being suggested to minimise the impact of private cars such as traffic flows being managed to 'discourage trips through the heart of the city centre' by making routes 'less appealing' to drivers.

"We also need more detail on further bus gates and other traffic manage-ment proposals and we are concerned there is no mention of a parking review."

MR PATRICK went on: "Glasgow city centre is unquestionably a key asset to the region and country.

"It is a hub for commerce and employment, educa-tion and research, retail and entertainment and tourism and travel.

"With that in mind, we want to work together with the city council to sustain city centre economic growth, encourage the discretionary journey and increase consumer dwell time, which is important to all city centre business."

The comment was backed by Evening Times reader, William McDonald who said: "Most folk who I know now shop at Braehead as Glasgow is becoming a no-go area.

"Poor planning by the council has multi-storey car parks in the areas they now want to be car free.

"We need a proper joined-up transport plan for the long-term."

On the Evening Times Facebook page Jim Mulholland said: "Glasgow Shopping RIP x, Cause of Death? - Council Greed."

Neil Greig of the motoring charity the IAM Trust said he believes bus gates in the city centre are "inevitable".

But he said roads bosses had to learn lessons from the Nelson Mandela Place bus gate.

When it was put in place in June it caught a daily average of almost 700 cars in its first weeks and in just two months generated fines of £1.5million.

Mr Greig said of the plans for new bus gates in Renfield Street and Oswald Street: "This is part of a longer term strategy to keep drivers out of Glasgow city centre.

"They need to make sure the signposting is logical and clear and to tell people the changes are going to happen and what they mean.

"It is almost inevitable this is going to happen. A lot of people feel they have missed out on the debate but the debate has been had over the years.

"The main problem with Nelson Mandela Place was that it was a huge change but it wasn't really properly communicated how big a change it was.

"With future bus gates, they need to get the message over that it is a big change and they need to make it easy for drivers to find alternative routes."

Reader Sharon Darkin said: "They have already got rid of most of the disabled parking - these spaces are needed for good reasons."

But the transport bosses believe the bus gates will benefit Glasgow.

Stephen Flynn, vice-chairman of Glasgow Taxis Ltd, said: "The concept of the bus gates makes sense and will help with congestion at some of the busiest parts of the city. However, the city centre still remains busy at off-peak times so we believe the new system should be in place 24 hours a day.

"As well as helping traffic flow, a 24-hour system would eliminate confusion around private vehicle access, therefore avoiding members of the public receiving unnecessary fines."

First Glasgow said it welcomed the city council's approach to prioritising public trans-port in the city centre.

A spokesman said: "Measures like bus gates reduce congestion and improve air quality but also help support bus operators in providing a quicker and stress-free means for our passengers to get from A to B."

City council land and environment spokesman Alistair Watson insisted extensive information would be made available to the public in advance of the bus gates opening in 2017.

He said: "A lot of people said they were not aware of the measures in Nelson Mandela Place. Many people who were caught out by it told us the signing and the notification were inadequate.

"In future, we need to make sure the notification we give to road users is as robust as we can make it.

"We think bus gates have a role to play in managing traffic and providing priority routes for public transport."

City centre Green councillor Nina Baker said she was broadly in favour of introducing bus gates at Renfield Street and Oswald Street.

She added: "If we are not going to go down the congestion charge route, bus gates are a way of giving preference to public transport.

"These are heavily used bus routes but we wouldn't be in this position if we had re-regulation of bus operators. Things which were suggested to the bus companies to do with air pollution were turned down flat by them."

vivienne.nicoll@ eveningtimes.co.uk