Lendal Bridge traffic ban: Car-free York makes for a happier city
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Lendal Bridge Week
We’re halfway through the six-month ban on private vehicles using Lendal Bridge between 10.30am to 5pm. This week YorkMix is running a series of articles from people with very different responses to the trial. What do you think? Comment below, Tweet us @theyorkmix or go to our Facebook page
It may affect his business in the short term, but Andy Shrimpton says the car ban will pay dividends for residents and visitors
When I was nineteen, I visited Copenhagen. What I experienced there in a few short days shaped the course of the rest of my life.
Here was a large, bustling city with grand promenades, historic waterfronts and gorgeous architecture; yet it had the convivial feel of a town with its green spaces, intimate squares and pavement cafes.
My insider guide was Danish and she showed me around her urban village. Stopping and chatting with her friends on the street, I experienced a quality of urban life that I had never encountered before.
I began to ask myself why all cities couldn’t be like this.
I didn’t have to look very hard. As she pointed out, the answer lay in how we moved around – by walking, and riding bikes, buses and trams. The city prioritised forms of transport that favoured street life, the communal experience and the collective needs of the many.
For Danes, the city’s public streets and spaces were a scarce resource too precious to be colonised willy-nilly by private cars.
In Copenhagen they realised years ago that allowing the car free-reign was not just causing problems of its own (pollution and congestion), but it was actively stifling the alternatives – slowing public transport and bullying terrified pedestrians and cyclists off the streets.
This in turn diminished the quality of street life, neighbourliness, social inclusion and the viability of local traders.
True to their egalitarian tradition, they have continued to invest in public transport and cycle infrastructure to an extent that 37 per cent of trips are now by bike. There were plenty of carrots, but to curtail car use they needed a few sticks.
Stemming the sewer
The so-called Lendal Bridge “closure” is one of those sticks. The way it’s been introduced is pretty blunt, but with the prospect of ever increasing congestion, ask yourself this: what kind of city do you want to live in? (Ask anyone from Copenhagen if they’d rather live in York).
And guess what? The bridge is still open – open all of the time to those who choose to travel in a way that is appropriate to York’s scale and sense of place. According to the last York travel survey that’s the majority of us, as 60 per cent of trips in this city are made by foot, bus or bike.
And, as it happens, it’s open most of the time to private cars – including at rush hour.
But here’s a question: when each car takes up on average 65 square feet, why do a minority of travellers get to dominate such a valuable public asset as the street space in our historic city?
Indeed, if York seriously wants to be a world heritage city, why does it allow this sewer of traffic to pass right through its historic core?
Long-term benefit
As a businessman, in the short term, this bridge closure will do me no favours.
We face a serious competitive threat from out of town; our customers for the big ticket items normally come by car and have access problems; and yes, we too run a van and have to brave York’s “traffic”. Nor will the closure lead to an immediate surge in the number of cyclists, as these things take time.
But in the long run, we will certainly benefit – as will all city centre retailers. Studies have shown a positive economic impact from city centre car reduction just about everywhere it’s tried.
And as citizens, we’ll all benefit from the improvements in the public realm that such changes will begin to make possible.
The Danes, by the way, are officially the happiest people on earth.
- Andy Shrimpton is the managing director of Cycle Heaven
- For all our Lendal Bridge stories, click here
It makes me sad to see people ranting against each other about a part-time closure of a bridge for one group of traffic. Andy Shrimpton has a vision, he wants a better city life and he dares to find it a good idea to “ban” (what a negative word for a good idea) individual motorised traffic from a bridge close to the old centre from 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.. Tourists love old town centres and many of them don’t even arrive in a car but by train. But strolling around is (especially in British towns) spoilt by too many cars: It is noisy, dirty, smelly because of cars and it is dangerous.
If we talk about health and safety in our public space, also called streets, we should not let too many cars in. And if there really (??) is an overflow from Lendal bridge to other areas in York (see the comments here) and to residential areas, yes, then York has to think about widening its “no cars please zone”. Car emissions destroy buildings slowly, so if you want to keep your old city (for tourists and yourself) you have to start preventing cars to come in.
Here is a shopkeeper, yes a bicycle shopkeeper, and he asks for a better world in York for the majority of the York population pointing to Copenhagen and the Danish quality of life. He dares to say that it might even help his business in the long run. So what? Please people of York, look at Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Groningen, Bremen and many other places where bicycles are welcome and get advantages over cars and ask the inhabitants of these cities whether they would rather endure the car owning democracy of Britain. They would laugh at you. Or maybe cry, as the young women from Bremen did when they experienced the joys of cycling in the Cycling Demo Town of Darlington in the film “Beauty and the Bike”.
Why thank you Phil. Deverell was OTT. He does his argument no favours.
Andy, thanks for the response, and I take your points on board. The Ouse Bridge suggestion is about balance. I too want less pollution in York, who wouldn’t? The problem with Lendal Bridge being closed to cars is the problems it causes elsewhere. As a city we don’t want to completely alienate car drivers, and by slicing up the inner ring road we’ve done just that. I won’t get started on how it’s been done, that’s another story and because of it many people will never return to York. My thinking about Ouse Bridge was the ‘through route’ idea, so buses, taxis and cycles could access the city centre easily, straight through the middle. I did ask if computer modelling was done for the different options, but I never got a response sadly. Either way, and on a serious note, it has to be great news for yours and all cycle shops in the city as it becomes more bike friendly, and I wish you all the luck in the world as it is great to see local businesses thrive. Regards.
Spot-on, Mr Shrimpton.
There might be something I’m missing in this debate. Everyone seems to be talking/writing about a bridge that is ‘closed’. It isn’t closed. It’s open. In fact it’s more open than it was before. It’s more open to public transport, cyclists, pedestrians, taxis.
Road planning used to be entirely geared around the idea that if we ran out of space for cars then all you need to do is just build more road. ‘Build and provide’ is over. There is no more room. Standing traffic is symptomatic of too many vehicles occupying insufficient space. Creating more space simply created more traffic. Not less.
In terms of this particular bridge, well most of the time (three quarters of the time) the bridge is unrestricted. For pretty much most of the time car drivers are perfectly free to while away their lives sat in the stationary traffic that has become the hallmark of our cities.
Allowing vehicles to drive anywhere at anytime no longer has a future.
Also, as for me wanting to “throw stones”, this couldn’t be further from the truth, in fact, that’s more accurate regarding your posts. I came up with an alternative to the Lendal Bridge closure, what have you come up with? Nothing! Please try and be constructive as opposed to acting like you’re in a playground!
In reply to Phil. I think you misrepresent me. I said that it would do us no favours in the short term, but in the long term we will certainly benefit. As for your positive alternative suggestion of closing Ouse Bridge, the transport planners at COYC thought long and hard about each option (they are not stupid) and opted for Lendal beacuse a) it has more through traffic than Ouse Bridge (which they want to remove from the city centre. You can argue about the merits of this – but that is their stated aim); b) because they want to improve the walking approach to town from the station for visitors – which is very unpleasant; and c) because they want to invest in and improve the environment around St Leonard’s Place and the art gallery. That would be pretty hard with pre-closure traffic levels. It’s great to see however that you are not against a bridge closure on principle – so a positive suggestion indeed.
Mr Deverell, once again you manage to make absolutely no point, other than to try and belittle me. Maybe you should become a City of York councillor, if you read their twitter feeds that appears to be their forte too!
The trial closure of Lendal Bridge is a brave, bold step in the direction of reducing congestion and improving air quality in the city centre (St Leonard’s was only beaten by the A1 as the worst in the country previously). Its also a massive bus priority scheme, incentive to walk and cycle, safety and public health improving measure. I really hope it works at keeping cars out of our lovely city. Congestion charging or bridge tolls were the other options likely to work, but York Labour promised not to bring in congestion charges as part of its manifesto.
Anna’s points are just sloganeering.
‘Air quality’, all that has happened is that traffic has been displaced from one area to another – not only that but displaced from areas without many people living there and dominated by temporary visitors to areas of residential use. Its not an overall drop in air pollution, but a shifting from one area to another.
‘Bus priority scheme’. Well, buses certainly travel faster over the bridge, but elsewhere they are caught up in jams from displaced congestion and there’s no evidence that bus journeys are improved overall.
‘Incentive to walk and cycle’. I’m pretty sure any incentive is minimal; how is one bridge dominated by fast moving buses and taxis a significantly greater incentive to walk or cycle into York than one dominated by slow moving buses, taxis and other vehicles?
As for safety and public health, as with air pollution, they problems are just moved elsewhere, often to residential areas.
It may be an anti-car campaigner’s fantasy wish list, but it doesn’t bear any relationship to reality.
Mr Deverill, the author made it personal by bringing his own PERSONAL business into it. I do have the brains to understand it, hence I’m able to suggest an alternative. Also, I do ride a bike, as well as driving a car, so I thoroughly enjoy York’s marvellous provision for cyclists. How sad that you resort to personal attacks rather than actually making a point.
Mr Seymour – If you do have a brain like you stated is the “spelling” section clouded by your failure to understand the differernce between a personal attack a personal buisness? P.S….I was simply giving you a bit of what you were dishing out and like most people who want to throw stones your reaction was so predicatable……
The closure of Lendal Bridge is a《Test》, 《 Pilot》 ,《limited exercise》, 《experiment》…insert the appropriate adjective..
All of the above are only undertaken to prove or disprove a measurable objective.
What no one seems to be able to clearly communicate is what the measurable objectives are.
All we are told are the unmeasurable benefits:
Happier, quieter, quicker, slower, easier, quieter…..
These are all subjective measurements that each of us have different expectations of.
Without SMART objectives the closure should be halted now.
S – Simple
M – Measurable
A – Achievable
R – Realistic
T -Timely
If we understand the objectives and measures then we understand why the closure is taking place and why it is for a period of 6 months.
Has anyone asked the appropriate council member for an explanation of the objectives?
Dont ask me, I’m just a Senior Test Manager….
Surprise Surprise – There is always one respondent who needs to make personal attacks on other peoples opinions. MR Seymour! Did your parents take away your Teddybear too early? or is it the fact that you may not possibly have the “Brain function” that you were born with to understand that the responses are geared up to the Trial? …and not to hate mongering…..GET ON YOUR BIKE!
I think the closure is fantastic
I would rather have a decrease in traffic on my doorstep, where my children cross roads and the air we breathe most frequently is becoming more and more polluted. The closure of Lendal Bridge during the day has led to a significant increase in traffic congestion on Scarcroft Road, Bishopthorpe Road and Nunnery Lane as vehicles are forced to reroute over Skeldergate Bridge.
Doogie, as I have commented on Alison Sinclair’s piece, I do not agree with your and her observations of increased traffic on Bishopthorpe Road and the Nunnery Lane gyratory. I spend most of my life (both work and home) in this area and I honestly see no increase in congestion. It’s always been bad and gets worse as the weather deteriorates. As a point of clarification, the bridge is not closed, it’s open all the time to the majority of people who use it (60%) i.e. pedestrians, bus passengers and cyclists. Its use is restricted for part of the day to a minority of people who use it, i.e. car drivers.
Anything that reduces cars in a city centre has got to be encouraged. Less fumes for us all to breath, less noise, safer streets (when was the last time a cyclist killed someone?), less oil being burnt, less parking problems, less gridlock, less potholes, collapsed drains and roadworks, better health and a much nicer city for everyone to live and work in.
Rush hour traffic in virtually any city centre is beyond ridiculous these days. Everyone fighting and stressed averaging 7mph and 10mpg. Things have got to change and this a brave but much needed step.
I think the car-ban is a terrific idea and I agree that from a safety, social and health perspective this should be made permanent and other areas of York should also become car-free. I am a very proud owner of a Gazelle Orange Plus which I bought from Cycle Heaven and hoo-boy I love my bike! I really encourage people to go and do a test drive of this incredible bicycle. It is the Rolls Royce of bicycles that’s for sure! I no longer have back pain which I used to have riding my previous bike as when you ride a gazelle it allows you to sit up straight and proud 🙂
All the best from a happy cyclist,
Cindy
To create a City fit for the future – combatting problematic air quality, creating spaces that we want to spend quality time in (and not just pass through) – demands tough decisions. The partial closure of Lendal Bridge may feel painful initially, but who would now contest the pedestrianisation of the zone around the Minster?
Surprise surprise, a man who owns a bike shop thinks it’s great that more people will have to use bikes instead of cars. Anyone fooled by the “it’s damaging to my business, but I still support it” garbage doesn’t have the brains they were born with! If he is in favour of a through route for buses and bikes then surely Ouse Bridge is the route. Using this there would be a sensible through flow via Micklegate, Ouse Bridge, copperplate, whilst keeping the inner ring road intact for cars. Lendal Bridge doesn’t make any sense unless there is an ulterior motive, such as benefits for the old or new council offices.