Tombland – an unfolding problem of inept design

Tombland
Tombland is being rebuilt (picture Norfolk CC)

A few weeks ago we outlined the problems cyclists were having with the works being carried out on the southern half of Tombland around the Ethelbert Gate (Read it here). The campaign, in the form of Derek W and Richard B have been attending meetings with the people from Norfolk CC involved in the project to try to improve things, but the results are not good.

First the nearest thing to a positive outcome has been the setting up of an alternative route for cycles to avoid the whole sorry mess. Now this does represent an achievement of sorts, in that a cycle diversion had never been done by Norfolk CC before, so this is (almost) a first and would have been if it were not for an issue with Marriott’s way, but that’s another story.

The problem is it’s a diversion made by people who are used to dealing with motorised traffic and it demonstrates how the road engineers we are dealing with have absolutely no idea how to design for cycling.

The route they’ve come up with leaves Magdalen Street at Colegate and goes via St Georges Street, up St Andrews hill and dumps you in the traffic confusion of Agricultural Hall Plain. It’s a long diversion which includes a hill and heavy traffic, it’s about as much use as a chocolate fireguard, but at least it exists. I suppose we should be grateful.

Derek rode the diversion route and made a video.

That, sadly is almost all the positive news we have.

The Tombland project is bad for cycling

Actually, that’s being generous, the scheme claims to be designed to improve conditions for cycling but that is untrue, it’s making cycling more dangerous, it’s simply terrible.

map of tombland
Map of Tombland – click to enlarge

The design now being built will remove some cycling infrastructure and damage what’s left, while adding a serious hazard and making access to two cycle routes more difficult. There are no positives, it is a terrible scheme.

When the Pink pedalway was built a few years ago, money was given to Norwich to build cycle infrastructure. Sadly an an eye watering amount – hundreds of thousands of pounds – of this grant was spent making the Erpingham Gate look nice and rebuilding the road layout.

Tombland is a heavily cycled route yet nothing was done to serve the cyclists already using the area, instead the Pink pedalway project created an entirely new route and all this gave us was a short section of cycle track to connect Princes Street to Palace Street via a light controlled crossing over Tombland (#1 on the map).

This is almost certainly the most expensive bit of cycle track in the UK and to make things worse, it didn’t cater for the vast majority of cycle trips along Tombland which don’t go down Palace Street. We did try to point this out but our objections at the time were simply ignored. The predictable result is that most cyclists using Tombland understandably ignore the cycle track.

However, the Pink pedalway route did actually work quite well for the minority of journeys using that route although the palace street section was bodged. So some riders do use it, so the thing wasn’t absolutely entirely useless. But it could – should – have been so much better.

1: The safe crossing to Princes Street removed

Now however, the safe light controlled crossing over Tombland has been removed (#3 on the map). The road through Tombland is one of the major arterial roads through the city and can be very busy. We were told that the works are intended to “make the traffic flow smoother”, which of course will only increase the traffic.

Cyclists using the Pink pedalway are expected to make their way across this busy road by waiting for the nearby pedestrian crossing (#2 on the map) to change and hoping drivers obey the “Keep Clear” text on the road surface. Tombland will be the only place on the pedalway network where a cycle route crosses a major road without a light assisted crossing. This breaks the Pink pedalway and will only serve to make the Tombland cycle track even more useless.

2: The cycle track is being reduced in length

The length of the cycle track is being reduced in length (#4 on the map) and riders will be expected to re-join the busy traffic at the point where the crossing used to be. The diagonal route across the square, which used to provide a safe link to St Faiths Lane, has now gone (#5 on the map)

This will damage the existing cycling infrastructure by removing a safe crossing point and reducing the length of the existing track which did provide a safe access to the St Faiths Lane (Green pedalway) route toward the station.

It is designed deliberately to encourage cyclists into heavy traffic and of course, make them stop before doing so. This will make the southbound cycle track pretty much useless and deter cyclist from using Princes Street, the Pink pedalway as well as safely accessing St Faiths Lane, the Green pedalway.

3: The square will become shared use

It should be noted that it will be allowed to cycle (slowly) across the new square, weaving through the alfresco diners using the nearby restaurants and the throngs of tourists.

We have been told however that because there is a kerb along the edge of the cycle track if you want to do that, you’re advised to leave the cycle track at the Erpingham gate and cycle on the pedestrian area, they won’t even be putting a drop kerb on the cycle track to allow easy access. Quite how you get through the chairs and tables outside the restaurant here wasn’t explained.

table in Tombland
Cyclists are expected to ride on the pavement here to reach the shared use area beyond, or bounce up the kerb. The tree in the distance will be removed for some reason.

This will encourage conflicts between cyclists and pedestrians and is likely to create bad feeling towards cyclists.

4: Ride in the traffic

To get to the St Faith’s Lane route – an excellent traffic free way to get close to the station which is something of a secret because it’s barely signed (even though it’s the green pedalway) will involve leaving the cycle track, riding in the traffic and turning left into Queen Street if you don’t like the idea of weaving slowly through the crowds.

It will make access to the safe route to the station via St Faiths Lane harder and more dangerous to get to, so fewer people will use it.

4: Bus stops and loading bay

They are moving the bus stop and converting the layby (#7 on the map) into what we were told would be an out of hours delivery bay, but which is now apparently to also be used by coaches to set down and collect tourists. This will mean large vehicles, the drivers of which are probably not familiar with the area, pulling out into the carriageway at busy times.

The bus stops are being relocated to the narrow section of Upper King Street between Tombland and Agricultural Hall Plain (#8 on the map) to a point just north of where the buses turn right into the bus lane toward Castle Meadow just ahead of where cyclists need to get to the centre island to cross toward King Street (#9 on the map). There will be two bus stops here, serving large double deckers, so riders will have to overtake two buses, the front one of which may well pull out.

The carriageway is being narrowed just before this point, also making life even more difficult for cyclists.

To summarise

The Tombland works, billed as being done to improve cycling in the area will clearly make cycling more dangerous. The stated aim of the council is to improve cycling and to encourage more people to do so, clearly that is no more than meaningless rhetoric.

The changes will remove what functionality the Tombland cycle track had, adding to what can only be described as a scandal of squandered “cycle ambition” grant money.

The council has refused to address any of these concerns on the basis that the scheme went through a consultation process (albeit some time ago now) and the decisions have been made and so can’t be changed, no matter how dangerous or stupid they are. It should be pointed out that the campaign made these points to the enquiry and all of our comments were dismissed.

Nearly forgot – the other little bit of good news? They’ve finally put some nice looking expensive bollards along the edge of the now useless cycle ack to stop people parking on it. They are very nice bollards.

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