How to reduce congestion on York's roads

The Department for Transport approved 16 major transport projects across the country. Access York, which would create 1,600 new Park&Ride spaces at Askham Bar, Clifton Moor and the A59 near Poppleton, was not among them.

The three Park&Rides are seen as vital to York’s future transport strategy. While failure to get the money this year for the first phase of the Access York project was a setback, it is not the end of the world, according to Bill Woolley, York council’s director of city strategy.

A second round of Department for Transport grants will be announced next year. “We are still hopeful and optimistic that we will be in the next tranche announced in 2011,” Mr Woolley says.

There are two key reasons for his confidence. The scheme does well on Government cost/benefit measurements – it would deliver a lot of benefit for the money spent. It is deliverable, too, Mr Woodley says.

For the time being, however, city transport bosses face a difficult dilemma. Do they gamble by pressing ahead with preparatory work for the project – which could cost hundreds of thousands of pounds – in the belief they will get the Government money next year? Or do they wait until they know for sure?

Mr Woolley says that the council does not have enough information to make that call at present.

Even if the city does receive the Access York money next year, funds for other traffic schemes – such as bus and cycle lanes and campaigns to get people to leave their cars behind – are likely to be severely restricted.

Between 2001 and 2006, the council received £30 million for transport initiatives, averaging £6 million a year. Between 2006 and 2011, that fell to £18 million – £3.6 million a year. The expectation is that between 2011 and 2016, the council will receive £7.5 million, Mr Woolley says, or £1.5 million a year.

Every penny will have to count – especially in the light of a council report that suggests gridlock in York could treble by 2026.

Ideas for easing congestion over and above the new Park&Rides outlined in that council report included improving all roundabouts along the outer ring road (estimated cost £35 million); dualling all or part of the outer ring road (estimated cost £100 to £200 million); improving public transport (£16 million over ten years); expanding the city’s cycle network (£13 million over ten years); and an out-of-town freight centre to reduce the need for heavy delivery lorries to come into the city (set-up costs £5 million).

How much of this happens will depend on how much the city receives in grants, Mr Woolley stresses. So is it time to look at some more radical suggestions?

Congestion charging is not going to happen, Mr Woolley says. Asking businesses to contribute to the cost of transport schemes would not be feasible – although they could do more to encourage employees to cycle, walk or use public transport.

Working more closely with schools to ensure young people understand the need to rely less on the car may well have an impact in the future. But what else? We asked around…

The traffic flow expert

HOW to get York’s traffic moving more quickly and smoothly? Reduce the speed limit in the city to 10-15mph, says a leading expert in traffic modelling.

Mike Smith, a retired professor of mathematics at the University of York who spent more than 30 years using computers to develop sophisticated traffic models, says that would significantly reduce traffic jams – and motorists would reach their destinations as quickly as they do now.

York has a circular city centre and two major ring roads linked to the centre by radial roads like spokes. Mathematical analysis, using computers, of traffic flow on road networks like this has demonstrated that traffic distributes itself much better, and therefore flows more smoothly, if it is limited to 10-15mph, Prof Smith says. “Everybody would benefit.”

His idea would be to progressively reduce the speed limit the closer you get to the city centre, ending up with a 10-15mph limit as you approach the inner ring road.

It should even be possible to use the city’s traffic lights intelligently to ensure that motorists stick to the speed limit, he says.

By linking the lights in sequence along main routes into and around the city, it should be possible to time them so a motorist driving on the road would approach every light on green, provided they stuck to the speed limit. If they went faster, they would arrive at the next set of lights too early and get stopped.

“That gives them a very strong incentive to stick to the threshold,” he says.

Prof Smith is involved with Freeflow, a project involving the University of York, the city council and others, which is looking at using better traffic modelling to ease congestion. He says the result of introducing such a system would be that queues would be less and traffic flow better.

An experiment in Slough in the 1950s demonstrated that the method could work, he says. But that was on a single key road through the town centre. It had never been tried on a city-wide basis. Why? He doesn’t really know, except that speed limits and restrictions on car use are politically sensitive topics.

Traffic lights could also be used more intelligently to shift traffic jams away from key bus routes in York, Prof Smith adds – speeding up bus (and possibly cycle) journeys, and making these more attractive to potential users.

It is inevitable that in a city such as York, there will be traffic jams. But we can, by using linked traffic lights operating to a computer-modelled plan, influence where they will be. “It could be arranged that the traffic queues could be restricted to where there was not a bus lane.”

The key to both of these measures would be much more sophisticated computer modelling to decide on the best traffic management plans. But we have the data for it to be possible, he says. Between them, the measures he is suggesting “could make a real difference,” he believes.

What the politicians think...

• Labour: Tough on congestion without a congestion charge. That would be Labour’s motto if the party were to take control of York at the council elections next May, says Labour group leader James Alexander.

The first priority would be to lobby for Access York money for the new Park & Rides. But Labour would also want the power to regulate local bus services. “Such powers to set bus pricing and have greater influence over routes can have a significant impact.”

The party would push for York to be included in the Leeds City Region transport network – and for a ‘one journey-one ticket’ system where a single bus ticket could be used on buses operated by different companies. It would also banish the ftr.

Labour would “ensure that there was a movement to electric and dual-fuel buses and other vehicles”, Coun Alexander says. It would attempt to tackle the problems caused by the school run – and it would look at extending pedestrianisation.

•Lib Dems: York has already had considerable success in increasing the number of cyclists, and, through Park&Ride, in getting cars off the road, says city strategy boss Steve Galloway.

“So our view is that we have to do more of what we have been doing over the last few years.” That means pushing hard for the new Park & Rides, and creating more bus and cycle priority measures.

There should also be measures to encourage those who do drive to use smaller cars, Coun Galloway said. The reduced ResPark fees for people with small cars are an example of that. And what about cheaper city centre parking for those with small cars? “We would look at that – although it would be difficult to identify them accurately.”

The Lib Dems would also look at increasing pedestrianisation. “Fossgate is the next street scheduled.”

• Greens: The Greens in York support the City Beautiful concept of a ‘traffic free’ city centre, with essential access only for deliveries, emergency services and so-on, says Andy D’Agorne, leader of the city’s Greens. But how to achieve it?

Congestion charging looks unlikely, Coun D’Agorne said. “Although the Nottingham example of a workplace parking levy could be a possibility if applied across the Leeds city region as a whole.”

Funding from such a charge could go into subsidising public transport, probably in conjunction with a quality contract to ensure bus services were regular and frequent and operators used low-emission vehicles.

Bus fares should also be revised to allow day tickets that can be used with any bus company and a group discount Park&Ride ticket to encourage car sharing.

The Greens have pledged support for 20mph limits in residential areas. “These, combined with an emphasis on safe cycling and walking routes to schools, free cycle training etc could significantly cut the school-run traffic.”

• Conservatives: The time for tinkering is over, says Conservative group leader Ian Gillies, a former taxi driver. What is needed now is definitive action.

There needs to be much better modelling of traffic flows in the city to examine options, he says – and some bold pilot schemes. He would like to see Lendal Bridge closed for a period. “When it was closed, it seems to have relieved lots of traffic in and around the city centre.”

Thought should also be given to closing Ouse Bridge.

He would also like to see measures to encourage more York people to use Park&Rides – for example, giving people who live in a particular area a dedicated Park&Ride which they can use to get into the city centre for a nominal fee, perhaps 50p. He is also in favour of increasing pedestrianisation. And a city-wide 20mph zone? “It’s a red herring.”

York’s traffic in numbers

Park&Ride

Park&Ride use increased steadily up to 2007, leveled out in 2008 and dropped slightly in 2009, the city council says. A large part of this drop was due to loss of Aviva passengers at Monks Cross with the closure of their offices. Park&Rides still carry nearly three million passengers per year. This equates to removing up to 1,500 vehicles from the roads during morning peak hours and more than 3,000 during evening peak hours: equivalent to a ten mile queue.

Cycling

The number of cyclists in York rose by more than ten per cent between 2006 and 2009 based on automatic cycle counter data. Early indications are that the figure for 2010 will be higher still – perhaps as much as a 15 per cent overall increase.

Cars

In the same 2006 to 2009, period traffic volumes in the city centre during the peaks remained static or dropped slightly.