Do Sheffield City Council Have Something Against Roundabouts ?

[Chekhov]

2 minutes ago, butlers said:

Theres  50 percent more registered vehicles niw that 1989

But they are used less, the total number of miles driven has not really changed :

 

[butlers]

That looks to me like ,its 700 billion passenger miles recently rather than 470.

 

[RollingJ]

2 hours ago, butlers said:

That looks to me like ,its 700 billion passenger miles recently rather than 470.

 

The graph is in km, not m.

[Chekhov]

2 hours ago, butlers said:

That looks to me like ,its 700 billion passenger miles recently rather than 470.

I would agree that graph could do with some lines on it, but to me it's more from about  600 Billion km in the early 90s,  to about 650 Billion av over the last 5 years (excl the pandemic)

[Planner1]

2 hours ago, Chekhov said:

It comes down to this, if using a certain type of junction significantly reduces capacity for 99% of its users (incl any passengers in those vehicles), but makes it easier to use for the other 1% (cyclists mainly), is that reasonable ?

 I cannot help thinking that if the council were having to pay, even at only at the national minimum wage for all the time people had to spend waiting in queues, they'd sort the roads out on double quick time.

Depends on your point of view

 

Most local authorities and the government have adopted carbon reduction targets that mean there will need to be a significant shift from motorised transport to walking and cycling.

 

If those targets are to be met, barriers to walking and cycling need to be removed.

 

You can therefore  argue that strategically, it’s acceptable to delay general traffic and prioritise active travel modes.

 

Pretty much all funding for transport schemes comes from the government. They have a methodology for assessing scheme business cases that monetises all the benefits and dis benefits and comes up with a benefit cost ratio (BCR). Government advice is that the BCR ( the economic case) isn’t always the highest priority and schemes can progress that don’t necessarily have a “good” BCR, but there’s a good strategic case for the scheme.

 

Much of the government transport funding that is currently available to local authorities is targeted at active travel and public transport. Not many schemes come forward nowadays just to increase capacity for general traffic.

 

In any case, no-one anywhere has enough money to throw at road schemes to eliminate delays to traffic altogether.

 

 

[Chekhov]

5 minutes ago, Planner1 said:

Depends on your point of view

Most local authorities and the government have adopted carbon reduction targets that mean there will need to be a significant shift from motorised transport to walking and cycling.

If those targets are to be met, barriers to walking and cycling need to be removed.

You can therefore  argue that strategically, it’s acceptable to delay general traffic and prioritise active travel modes.

Pretty much all funding for transport schemes comes from the government. They have a methodology for assessing scheme business cases that monetises all the benefits and dis benefits and comes up with a benefit cost ratio (BCR). Government advice is that the BCR ( the economic case) isn’t always the highest priority and schemes can progress that don’t necessarily have a “good” BCR, but there’s a good strategic case for the scheme.

Much of the government transport funding that is currently available to local authorities is targeted at active travel and public transport. Not many schemes come forward nowadays just to increase capacity for general traffic.

In any case, no-one anywhere has enough money to throw at road schemes to eliminate delays to traffic altogether.

If money is short and it has to be used for the minority usage that smacks of, tails, wagging and dogs to me.

I'm not saying cyclists needs should be ignored, even less pedestrians, but the strategy should be more proportionate.

[Planner1]

1 hour ago, Chekhov said:

If money is short and it has to be used for the minority usage that smacks of, tails, wagging and dogs to me.

I'm not saying cyclists needs should be ignored, even less pedestrians, but the strategy should be more proportionate.

I’d disagree.

 

I’d expect that funding would be used to achieve the policy aims of the funder and the delivery organisation.

 

Transport policy at the moment is to prioritise active travel and public transport.

[Longcol]

11 hours ago, Chekhov said:

But they are used less, the total number of miles driven has not really changed :

 

It has increased though - and we have a big increase in the number of vehicles - so what has happened is that we have a large increase in vehicles, especially in urban areas, doing short journeys, hence the increased congestion.

 

[spilldig]

14 hours ago, Planner1 said:

Depends on your point of view

 

Most local authorities and the government have adopted carbon reduction targets that mean there will need to be a significant shift from motorised transport to walking and cycling.

 

If those targets are to be met, barriers to walking and cycling need to be removed.

 

You can therefore  argue that strategically, it’s acceptable to delay general traffic and prioritise active travel modes.

 

Pretty much all funding for transport schemes comes from the government. They have a methodology for assessing scheme business cases that monetises all the benefits and dis benefits and comes up with a benefit cost ratio (BCR). Government advice is that the BCR ( the economic case) isn’t always the highest priority and schemes can progress that don’t necessarily have a “good” BCR, but there’s a good strategic case for the scheme.

 

Much of the government transport funding that is currently available to local authorities is targeted at active travel and public transport. Not many schemes come forward nowadays just to increase capacity for general traffic.

 

In any case, no-one anywhere has enough money to throw at road schemes to eliminate delays to traffic altogether.

 

 

As far as I can see it's about cutting pollution but as I see it closing roads, or "Rat runs" as they call them stops traffic moving freely and puts more traffic on one road thereby either causing jams or stop/start situations and vastly increasing pollution and I don't think it helps matters by naming council tax paying motorist "Rats".

[Planner1]

2 hours ago, spilldig said:

As far as I can see it's about cutting pollution but as I see it closing roads, or "Rat runs" as they call them stops traffic moving freely and puts more traffic on one road thereby either causing jams or stop/start situations and vastly increasing pollution and I don't think it helps matters by naming council tax paying motorist "Rats".

This thread is about roundabouts and the conversation was on the merits of signalled junctions vs roundabouts and prioritisation of available funding.

 

What you are talking about is low traffic neighbourhoods, which is a somewhat different thing. It’s designed to get more people walking and cycling, particularly on shorter local trips. It also improves safety, air quality and noise pollution in the scheme area.

 

There have been quite a few of them introduced in recent years in London, so that’s where the research is being done. From the studies I’ve seen, LTN’s do not actually increase traffic on the roads around their periphery and so there’s no increase in pollution.

 

What happens is referred to as “traffic evaporation”. Route choices include many factors and drivers don’t often follow what you or I might think of as the logical choice of route if they are just having to now avoid a particular area. They go a different way altogether, as it suits their purpose better. So, resulting traffic diversions are spread across the network and aren’t really noticeable. That’s what appears to have happened in London.

 

It is something that’s been observed worldwide and studies have been done on it by eminent people in the industry ( Professor Phil Goodwin for one).

 

Have a read of this article which covers a lot of the questions people have about LTN’s and includes links to research.