Carboot Circus eclipsed

Carboot Circus, barely 2½ weeks old, is about to face a newer, bigger more avaricious competitor. At the end of this month the Westfield Centre in west London opens and is set to put poor little Carboot Circus firmly in the shade. It's everything that Carboot Circus is, but much more so. Westfield Centre has 1.6 million square feet of space, 260 stores, 50 restaurants, a 13 screen cinema, parking for 4,500 cars, several new tube, rail and bus stations (60% of visitors are expected to use public transport) and is costing £1.6 billion to build.



Westfield is aiming for exactly the same market as Carboot Circus, with 'anchor' stores including House of Fraser, Marks & Spencers, Debenhams, Next and Waitrose, plus a range of prestigious high-end names like Louis Vuitton in its exclusive 'Village' area (definitely no peasants). It also has a wavy roof of glass panels, multi-levels and proper hanging gardens, but that much more impressive in scale. If you believe such nonsence, it will create 7,000 new jobs (or rather transfer them from other ares, including no doubt a few from Carboot Circus).

Carboot Circus made much of their catchment area extending to areas like Swindon and the Cotswolds, but for such areas west London is only a little further and public transport connections are that much better. So many shoppers, particularly the high spenders for whom train fares are small beer, may look disdainfully at Westfield's poor imitation in Bristol. Carboot Circus' brief reign as having a unique style is already coming to an end.

Meanwhile Carboot Circus suffered another mishap on Sunday evening when a power cut halted the showing of films at the Showcase Cinema, forcing hundreds of customers to be ushered out. Another example of over hasty construction leading to faults?

Welcome to Southville Roads

I'm not sure if I started it all back on May 18th, but some of my earliest sidebar posts were pictures of badly parked cars, followed by my first blog on parking on 1st June. The excellent Bristol Traffic promptly took up the theme and has since turned it into an art form with creative sarcasm. Now my Google searches have picked up another blog on the same theme - Southville Roads - started at the beginning of September. I've added a link to my sidebar.



I like his style (assuming it's a he - it usually is since women generally have better things to do with their time than vent their frustrations via a blog), not quite as wryly detached as Bristol Traffic but still witty and with the anger more evident. That's my baby.

So that's Southville covered and Cotham/Clifton tends to feature in Bristol Traffic, leaving 30 odd wards still crying out for their own version of Bristol Traffic. Blogspot blogs are very simple to set up and cost nothing in money (although plenty of time, once you get addicted), so how about it before the market gets saturated?

Vocal but Deluded

Back in the spring the Evening Post was persuaded to abandon it's traditional, rabid anti-cycling views in order to give a clear run for the council's Cycling City bid. The editorial change of heart was no doubt influenced by having badly misjudged the public mood earlier when they backed plans to convert the Bristol & Bath Railway Path into a route for Bus Rapid Transport, plans that provoked such unprecedented public opposition that the Post was forced eventually to side with the people.

For a while it appeared as if the Post might be a reformed character, willing to look objectively at the issues and even to give positive coverage to proposals to promote cycling. But once the Cycling City funding was in the bag the cracks began to appear in the pro-cycling facade as the Post's baser instincts began to assert themselves. Recent comments by 'Cycling Champion' Terry Cook have led to some provocative headlines, notably Thursday's 'Let's make Bristol city centre bike-only', based on an off the cuff idea voiced by the hapless Cook that has no official backing whatsoever.



Finally the facade fell away with Thursday's "On your bike" editorial comment, according to which "we need to stop pandering to the vocal but deluded cycling lobby". Who is this 'vocal but deluded cycling lobby'? Terry Cook perhaps? The Evening Post itself just a few months ago? If so the comment might have some justification, but as far as the wider 'cycling lobby' is concerned it is far from the mark. For a start most cyclists are rather taciturn and often sceptical of plans such as those put forward under the Cycling City banner.

So it seems that the Evening Post has reverted to type, so to speak, and we now see the resumption of trench warfare as a valiant band of pro-cycling commentators slug it out with the anti-cycling brigade in the letters and comments columns of the Post. If you can spare a few minutes during the day why not have a bit of fun and join in?

Cycling City Crisis

Why is it that everything with the initials CC in its name turns out to be such a let down for cyclists? We have Carboot Circus, (Bristol) City Council, and of course Cycling City.

Bizarrely the City Council were awarded Cycling City status back in June even though they continue to back profoundly unpopular plans by West of England Partnership to convert the city's one outstanding cycle route, the Bristol & Bath Railway Path, into a Bus Rapid Transit route.

Not an auspicious start for the 3 year project and things have continued in much the same vein, with local democracy being an early victim as vested interests position themselves to pocket the £20 million of taxpayers' money being thrown at Cycling City. Ordinary cyclists have found themselves very much out in the cold, even to the extent of being refused entry to consultative meetings.

So anxious are the Council to keep trouble makers (i.e. anyone who doesn't agree with what they say) out of the decision making process that they went so far as to nominate the person who they wished to be the representative of the Bristol Cycling Campaign (hmm, another CC) on the Cycling City Stakeholders' Panel, an outrageous presumption that the Cycling Campaign meekly accepted.



But there are thankfully a few local cyclists who take exception to the arrogance of the Council and their acolytes. Led by the redoubtable Joshua Hart (above), they are making a last ditch attempt to gain some influence over the process of determining where the funding should go at a meeting of the Stakeholders' Forum (no, not the Stakeholders' Panel - confusing, isn't it? It's meant to be.) to be held at Fairfield High School, Allfoxton Road, Horfield this Wednesday at 6pm.

It has to be said that the prospects do not look good. Word is that the spending plan has already been stitched up amongst the vested interests, including of course local charities like Sustrans, who will no doubt find themselves with substantial roles (and funding) in the Cycling City project. The termination of the project in a little more than 2½ years makes for rushed decisions and short term thinking.

But who dares wins, in the end. So now is the time for the city's cyclists to ask themselves whether they are content to have their tax money spent to bolster the prestige of the incumbent vested interests or whether they want their tax money spent in a manner that is targeted firmly at making Bristol better for cyclists. If they don't show what they're made of now they may never get another chance.

Car park is "evil" - Ferguson

I have to admit that sometimes George Ferguson hits the nail on the head. So it is in his latest By George column in the Evening Post. Talking about the new Carboot Circus development Ferguson refers to the giant 2,600 space car park as "the necessary evil" to make the shopping centre work.



I'd have hesitated to go so far as calling a mass of steel and concrete "evil" myself, but then I'm not a famous architect. So thanks to George for reminding us what it's all about. Forget about Park & Ride, buses, walking and cycling - it's all about the 7-days-a-week influx of thousands of cars and having a really flash place to park them all.

2,600 is a hell of a lot of parking spaces (over 10 times what George manages to cram into his Chocolate Factory development). Even so my own casual observations suggest that for every car parked at some expense in the state-of-the-art multistorey car park there will be another parked for free in the streets of St Jude's and St Paul's. Residents of River Street are particularly hard hit, having the monstrous car park looming over them (below) and all the extra traffic noise and pollution blighting their lives, but also finding that they and their visitors will be lucky to find a place to park within walking distance.



Similarly cyclists find that places to park and securely lock their bicycles are few and far between at Carboot Circus. It seems that since they won't be able to carry as much useless, overpriced tat away with them compared to motorists they are not to be made welcome at the Cathedral of Commerce. Nevertheless some appear to be visiting (perhaps taking a break from the futile search for a safe and convenient way of cycling through or around a development which has obliterated so many formerly useful cycle routes) and have had to improvise when it comes to cycle parking.