Sheffield's First Dutch-Style Roundabout Nears Completion at West Bar

[Resident]

10 hours ago, hackey lad said:

Yes . You know the council will have done a full analysis and projection of cycle usage there . 

You mean like they did with Shalesmoor?

 

[SheffieldForum]

There’s a lot of consultation, study and information gone into active travel that has defined the policies — particularly last decade leading into this one, and done by central government, SYMCA and the council.

 

It all formed part of what is now the Sheffield Transport Strategy and Sheffield City Region transport strategy (whether it is at a council or mayoral level) — which, from memory started a couple of years ago and has a term to 2035/2040.

[RollingJ]

4 minutes ago, SheffieldForum said:

There’s a lot of consultation, study and information gone into active travel that has defined the policies — particularly last decade leading into this one, and done by central government, SYMCA and the council.

 

It all formed part of what is now the Sheffield Transport Strategy and Sheffield City Region transport strategy (whether it is at a council or mayoral level) — which, from memory started a couple of years ago and has a term to 2035/2040.

I have no wish to start an argument, but that doesn't answer a question I have asked -is it value for money? Don't know who funded this, but hopefully it wasn't a 'cash-strapped' SCC?

[Mkapaka]

On 24/09/2024 at 15:37, sheffbag said:

its an absolute mess, speaking as someone who works literally a wall away from the work been done (and deafened by it, we did have sound screens for a couple of weeks but they soon disappeared)

The road at the moment clogs up coming from the courts from about 3 onwards as traffic cant get onto the roundabout. Giving pedestrians priority there will only increase this. 

It has always been one of the congestion hotspots with people coming down the hill trying to get on the ring road. This is only going to make it worse.

that’s because it’s not been designed for cars.

 

the scheme doesn’t want you to drive down there unless it’s absolutely necessary.

[RollingJ]

1 minute ago, Mkapaka said:

the scheme doesn’t want you to drive down there unless it’s absolutely necessary.

They don't want you to drive anywhere - necessary or not.

[SheffieldForum]

1 hour ago, RollingJ said:

I have no wish to start an argument, but that doesn't answer a question I have asked -is it value for money? Don't know who funded this, but hopefully it wasn't a 'cash-strapped' SCC?

It has gone through lots of phases of consultation and checks, so I would imagine it has been deemed to be value for money by the government.

 

I believe this project forms part of the Active Travel funding which is allocated by central government via SYMCA.

 

It is worth mentioning that partly the cycling infrastructure being built across the city as part of the Connecting Sheffield programme is to encourage increased use in future, moreso than to cater for existing users. Consultations showed that around 70-80% of all car journeys in the city were for less than three miles (particularly at peak times), and that a similar percentage of people indicated they would prefer to cycle, but that the cycling infrastructure simply wasn’t available.

 

Cycling infrastructure in this city has long been an afterthought, and piecemeal. The evidence is that properly thought-out, and — importantly — routes that actually connect to places people want to go, see massively increased usage once completed.

 

There are also other benefits to encouraging active travel over car use, from environmental benefits to health benefits — and the infrastructure costs significantly less to build and maintain.

[Planner1]

1 hour ago, RollingJ said:

I have no wish to start an argument, but that doesn't answer a question I have asked -is it value for money? Don't know who funded this, but hopefully it wasn't a 'cash-strapped' SCC?

I’ve mentioned it on here often enough for you to understand this.

 

Funding for all significant transport schemes comes from the government, via the MCA. There are sometimes contributions from developers, but these are usually comparatively minor.

 

All schemes funded this way have to develop a business case, which involves calculation of the benefit cost ratio, which is used to assess value for money.

 

Typically the government want a BCR of 2:1 ie the benefits are at least  twice the costs. Schemes which involve promoting active travel typically don’t achieve that level because in the government’s methodology for calculating value for money, most of the monetised benefits arise from saving journey time for motorists. Therefore any scheme which delays motorists doesn’t produce a good value for money rating. Government guidance says that in such cases, other factors can be considered more important, such as strategic fit with policies and strategies.

 

 

[Planner1]

1 hour ago, RollingJ said:

They don't want you to drive anywhere - necessary or not.

Utter nonsense and you know it.

 

They would prefer you to walk or cycle for shorter journeys and are putting in place the infrastructure to allow that to happen safely.

 

Look on it as redressing the balance a little after many decades of investment to make things easier and quicker for motorists. Didn’t turn out too well did it?

[peak4]

I was going to tag @Planner1 into a reply last night in the hope that a factual response would be forthcoming; thanks for pre-empting me with the above.

The various schemes have been discussed, impact assessed, and costed for some time, such as this report from 2006 when I was still in Sheffield
There's not much point complaining after a scheme is approaching completion unless it's just for political point scoring; there was opportunity for input during the various consultations.
Plenty  of info available on the net, and the council's website(s); these are both downloadable pdf documents
West Bar Interim Planning Guidance ;JULY 2006

Along with more recent committee reports such as this
https://democracy.sheffield.gov.uk/documents/s60940/Kelham Island and Neepsend Active Travel and Public Transport Scheme.pdf

[ads36]

14 hours ago, RollingJ said:

Would be interesting to know how many cyclists use that route - just see if it is a value for money exercise.

 

right now - probably not many, precisely because there isn't a cycle route there.

 

build it, and the connecting links, and give it a few years, then start counting.