[Brighton] Valley Gardens works

[Gwylan]

Didnt they pay for the Isore?

There was a council loan, not payment (although there is a concern that we'll ever see all that money again) but it was for, I believe, £26m that's at least 50 times as much as any B&H metro would cost.

 

[Super Steve Earle]

I've lived and worked in and around Brighton for more than half a century. Fewer and fewer people are making the effort to get to Brighton Town Centre and the council admits this will make it worse due to additional delays. I have used the Churchill Square car park a few times recently and it's barely used in the mornings. Worse still, when returning to my car, I have seen several people doing as I have, rushing back to the car to avoid paying higher parking charges. It's clear that people aren't lingering to wander round the shops, have a coffee etc. I don't know if Brighton Debenhams is on the closure list, but it would serve this stupid council right if it loses it's anchor store in Churchill Square due to it's parking and traffic management schemes.

And don't get me started on the Valley Gardens road signs. It's 'Advance Warning of delays' not 'Advanced Warning' FFS!

 

[Weststander]

I've lived and worked in and around Brighton for more than half a century. Fewer and fewer people are making the effort to get to Brighton Town Centre and the council admits this will make it worse due to additional delays. I have used the Churchill Square car park a few times recently and it's barely used in the mornings. Worse still, when returning to my car, I have seen several people doing as I have, rushing back to the car to avoid paying higher parking charges. It's clear that people aren't lingering to wander round the shops, have a coffee etc. I don't know if Brighton Debenhams is on the closure list, but it would serve this stupid council right if it loses it's anchor store in Churchill Square due to it's parking and traffic management schemes.

And don't get me started on the Valley Gardens road signs. It's 'Advance Warning of delays' not 'Advanced Warning' FFS!

Agree with your post. The recent Green and Labour administrations were all about the stick for car drivers, deliberately making the journey slower with reduced lanes, chicanes, revised routes, more bus-only turns; without an ounce of a carrot of cheap public transport alternatives. Some decent bike lanes, which I use, but people aren’t going to cycle to go shopping for bulky goods or to go out for meals. Zero joined up thinking ... just another expensive scheme every few years, with huge sums paid to private transport consultants. In our large suburb of Withdean/Westdene, most the people we know never visit the city centre 3 miles away, unless they work there. The leisure visits are left to the 12 to 20 something year olds.

I’m not a ‘petrol head’ and like the posts of [MENTION=435]Stat Brother[/MENTION], but BHCC has not provided cheap, integrated means for residents to visit and non-residents to park and visit.

(But the one off Xmas ramp up is well and truly under way ... twice this week I I drove to the Churchill Sq car park at 9.15am and it was mobbed already.)

 

[The Large One]

I've lived and worked in and around Brighton for more than half a century. Fewer and fewer people are making the effort to get to Brighton Town Centre and the council admits this will make it worse due to additional delays.

Do you have empirical evidence to back up your assertion? Because bus passenger numbers of the past few years would suggest the exact opposite.

Of course things will be worse while it's being re-built. That not really much of a complaint, is it?

I have used the Churchill Square car park a few times recently and it's barely used in the mornings. Worse still, when returning to my car, I have seen several people doing as I have, rushing back to the car to avoid paying higher parking charges. It's clear that people aren't lingering to wander round the shops, have a coffee etc. I don't know if Brighton Debenhams is on the closure list, but it would serve this stupid council right if it loses it's anchor store in Churchill Square due to it's parking and traffic management schemes.

The Council doesn't operate Churchill Square car park, so I've no idea where you're coming from there.

 

[Super Steve Earle]

Do you have empirical evidence to back up your assertion? Because bus passenger numbers of the past few years would suggest the exact opposite.

Of course things will be worse while it's being re-built. That not really much of a complaint, is it?



The Council doesn't operate Churchill Square car park, so I've no idea where you're coming from there.

Since you have taken the trouble to reply, I'll do likewise. I wouldn't have made my assertion about 'I've lived and worked in and around Brighton for more than half a century. Fewer and fewer people are making the effort to get to Brighton Town Centre' without empirical evidence. For many years I have taken time off and done Christmas shopping in Churchill Square in late October and November. Having recently retired, I had more time this year and saw much fewer people than before in the stores (especially Debenhams) and the parking was a doddle with a choice of spaces even on the ground floor.
That's empirical by definition right? Based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic.

Of course things will be worse while it's being re-built. That not really much of a complaint, is it? I didn't make that complaint.

The Council may not operate the car park, but you know full well where I was coming from by linking the cost of Churchill Square car parking with the Council making it more difficult to get there when the Valley Gardens works are completed.

 

[Uter]

Councillor Lee Wares recently said this of the accident record at the junction. I think he owes logic an apology.

"To put it into context, based on Labour’s own figures, over a five-year data period, there has been only one pedestrian casualty rated as severe – and no deaths.

One casualty is one too many. However, with 50,000 vehicle journeys through the aquarium roundabout each day, equalling 91 million journeys over five years, there is a 1 in 91 million chance of a pedestrian being severely injured.

The odds of winning the National Lottery are 1 in 45 million – and over the same five years there were tragically 2,104 deaths from 171 million commercial flights. In reality, you are twice as likely to win the lottery or 1,000 times more likely to die in a plane crash than be severely injured as a pedestrian at the Aquarium roundabout."

 

[Stat Brother]

Councillor Lee Wares recently said this of the accident record at the junction. I think he owes logic an apology.

"To put it into context, based on Labour’s own figures, over a five-year data period, there has been only one pedestrian casualty rated as severe – and no deaths.

One casualty is one too many. However, with 50,000 vehicle journeys through the aquarium roundabout each day, equalling 91 million journeys over five years, there is a 1 in 91 million chance of a pedestrian being severely injured.

The odds of winning the National Lottery are 1 in 45 million – and over the same five years there were tragically 2,104 deaths from 171 million commercial flights. In reality, you are twice as likely to win the lottery or 1,000 times more likely to die in a plane crash than be severely injured as a pedestrian at the Aquarium roundabout."

I'll hazard a guess the reason why the severe injury figure is so low is mainly due to the speed, or lack of, the 50,000 vehicles travel at through the roundabout.

 

[Wardy's twin]

This mindset probably came about when having a car was a luxury and only the very rich could afford them. Slowly they became more affordable so only the rich could afford them and they were a status symbol. Then cheaper and cheaper so that the vast majority can now afford them.

However the cultural mindset of owning a car as a status symbol still exists. This may be a mindset shared by other nations, but I think more so by the British. The whole keeping up with the Joneses attitude and itching to have a nicer car than your neighbours and looking down on those who only have a second hand car, or god forbid don't own a car, the filthy animals.

Not sure what world you live in but I know no one who sees their car as a social status most feel it is a necessary evil.

 

[Wardy's twin]

What is the problem that this work is trying to solve , I would rather see spare money to improve the number of houses available for the citizens of Brighton.

 

[Stat Brother]

What is the problem that this work is trying to solve , I would rather see spare money to improve the number of houses available for the citizens of Brighton.

To stop 50,000 vehicles converging at the same spot, every day.

 

[Jack Straw]

Everywhere's been tidied up for the festive season. If you didn't know, you'd think they hadn't started yet apart from the storage areas at St.Peter's Church. Seems that the pavement is being done first. There's evidence of a crossing going in half-way along North Victoria Gardens. The build-out at Richmond Parade is complete and they've started the paving opposite North Vic. Can't wait for the horticulture!

 

[Jack Straw]

Just around the corner, the old fruit market Circus Street development is coming along at a pace.

 

[The Large One]

What is the problem that this work is trying to solve , I would rather see spare money to improve the number of houses available for the citizens of Brighton.

Valley Gardens is / was a nothing area in the centre of the city. This project which, in varying forms, has been backed by all council administrations for over 10 years (though the Tories largely sat on it when they had controlling interest of the council), is aimed to re-vitalise an otherwise moribund part of the centre of the city, and turn it into a more people-friendly space.

The vast majority of the money is coming from central government as a targeted capital funded bid - meaning that it can only be spent on this project. If it isn't, the council has to give the money back.

You want money from central government to build new houses? Not going to happen.

 

[ofco8]

Have never considered it a nothing area. Started to go down hill when spring and summer planting was stopped, the fountain stopped working and all and sundry allowed to tread paths criss crossing the grassed areas.
It used to be a really nice. welcoming green space in the city centre.
The shame is all administrations in recent years has just let the whole of the city centre look a tip.

 

[Wardy's twin]

Spending money just because there is money to spend is criminal if there is no tangible reason and when there are better things to spend the money on.

The green areas probably were not developed because of the river running through there, it became a garden at some time and was prettier but what it will be is the area inbetween two major routes in and out of Brighton.

If we are not spending money on much needed housing then the crumbling seafront would have been a much better target, that's what people come to see.

I accept that finances aren't all that simple but by spending money because we can (given it has to be paid for by taxes) is crazy.

It will be interesting to see the real benefits this delivers.......

 

[Albion Prem]

Do you have empirical evidence to back up your assertion? Because bus passenger numbers of the past few years would suggest the exact opposite.

Of course things will be worse while it's being re-built. That not really much of a complaint, is it?



The Council doesn't operate Churchill Square car park, so I've no idea where you're coming from there.

It does not matter who operates Churchill Square car park, this does not affect the comments made, suggest you ditch your large reference books and just cover the points made

 

[Jack Straw]

The paving and kerb stones opposite North Victoria are being renewed and the pavement at the junction of Kingswood Street by the Art College is also being re-modeled, as is Morley Street. The old Fruit Market site is also coming along at a pace.

 

[Jack Straw]

Some more.

 

[mickybha]

Phase 3 what a joke https://youtu.be/bvStWr8XThs

 

[Stat Brother]

Phase 3 what a joke https://youtu.be/bvStWr8XThs

Oh bless.

The freeflowing movement of traffic at the pier roundabout.

Do that again when it's not the middle of the day and the sun's out!