2018-02-21 19:52:05 +0000
To: Herefordshire Council
Scrap the Western Relief Road/Hereford Bypass
Hereford urgently needs better buses, better support for cycling and walking, 20mph speed limits, and safe routes to school. You intend to delay these much-needed improvements until the Hereford Bypass is built in 2025.
Traffic congestion and air pollution in Hereford is a problem NOW. It will get worse as more houses are built. A £200m bypass, which you acknowledge will 'not on its own reduce congestion,' is not the answer. We need lower cost, proven solutions now, not in 7 years time.
Please scrap plans to develop the Hereford Bypass before any sustainable measures have been tried.
Why is this important?
This is the follow on from the Southern Link Road, which was always a stealth precursor to the bypass plans. We will be updating this with more info in the coming days, meanwhile tell all your friends and relatives to get on board with this new campaign specially if your property is affected.
Highways England have said "under current guidance the building of new road infrastructure could only be justified in policy terms when other avenues such as travel planning and sustainable travel modes had been developed and shown not to address the transport needs and issues identified" (2014).
Following public consultation in 2017, Herefordshire Council acknowledged that "improving pedestrian and cycling routes were a priority" for respondents, and that "more reliable and quicker bus journeys were among the top five improvements that should be made a priority in Hereford".
One may legitimately ask why they are not acting on this feedback. They obviously have a different agenda that doesn't fit with the electorate's views.
We have been aware of the presence of way too many traffic light controls which rather than facilitating smooth transit around the city, are badly timed to seemingly snarl the city traffic on a daily basis ... 18 sets of lights on one junction being the perfect illustration of our point, and if you're a pedestrian you need to be amazingly nimble ... not a city for the weak and slow.
We also doubt there is anyone out there who believes this next item was a right way to behave ... Apologies don't cut it when people's homes and lives are at stake. PEOPLE living on the proposed routes of Hereford’s new bypass were not given notice that their houses could be demolished.
Many of the residents living on Kings Acre Road only discovered their homes were in the firing line of the western bypass when they saw reports in the Hereford Times or were told by neighbours.
http://www.herefordtimes.com/news/15998820.Hereford_residents_left_in_the_dark_about_proposed_bypass_through_their_street/
