The Living Heart for Bristol* has called on the West of England authorities to incorporate Bristol’s Green Capital ‘Good Transport Plan’ into the strategy it is writing for whole area. A failure to do this would be a waste of public money, they claim.
The four West of England authorities have been conducting a consultation into a joint transport study for the West of England area. Their draft strategy makes no reference to the Bristol Good Transport Plan which was developed by Bristol2015 and published last week. Though not a formal document, it was supported by the Mayor and Bristol’s head of Transport. Objective 5 of that plan is ‘a living heart for Bristol’.
Spokesman Steve Melia said:
“There has been a lot of controversy over whether the European Green Capital year made any difference to Bristol and whether the money spent was worth it. Well here is a key test. Hundreds of organisations and individuals worked for a year to produce the Good Transport Plan. It was funded by Bristol2015 and the Department for Energy and Climate Change. They produced a good plan but is it going to be implemented or was it all just talk?
Quite separately from all this the West of England authorities have been consulting on a plan that will be implemented. It will decide how transport is organised, what gets built and where money is spent. If all the effort and money put into the Green Capital is to mean anything, then we need to see some results from it. We call on the West of England authorities to incorporate the Good Transport Plan into their strategy on Bristol City Council, who supported this process, to push for its implementation.”
