Leaflets
BMA Sixth Leaflet Election April 2017
BMA Fifth Leaflet Protest Jan 2017
BMA Fourth Leaflet October 2016
BMA Third Leaflet September 2016
BMA Second Leaflet Summer 2016
BMA First Leaflet Spring 2016 inside pages
BMA First leaflet Spring 2016 outer pages
Adverts
SBM-Fourth Ad Jan 2017
Press Releases
Joint Petition Delivered to Bath Council
27th March 2017
Response to Cabinet meeting on 25th January
26th January 2017
Piers Taylor, presenter (BBC2) and architect slams council’s claims that it can ‘hide’ new east of Bath Park & Ride
20th January 2017
Huge Christmas parking demand to be met by ‘overspill’ Park & Ride that could save Bathampton Meadows
22nd November 2016
Bathampton Meadows Alliance invite Abbey Ward by-election candidates to visit Bathampton Meadows
10th November 2016
Campaigners warn parts of Odd Down P&R are becoming a ‘Ghost Town’
29th October 2016
Anti-park & ride campaigners say one of biggest causes of congestion in eastern Bath is school-run
21st June 2016
Press statement from Bathampton Meadows Alliance in response to publication of Scrutiny and LDF reports
27th April 2016
Anti-Park and Ride campaigners accuse Bath Council of ignoring pollution caused by school traffic
Anti-park and ride campaigners have called on Bath and North East Somerset council to launch a proper study as a matter of urgency into the illegally high pollution levels along the congested eastern routes into Bath. Emma Adams of the Bathampton Meadows Alliance said: “We know that levels of nitrogen dioxide at Lambridge are way above the legally permitted levels, and have been for several years, and that the measures the council has introduced are not bringing those levels down fast enough.
“Now, the levels of Nitrogen Dioxide on Batheaston High Street are close to the legal limit, and every morning during term time we are seeing longer queues of cars stretching back along Batheaston High Street, waiting to go down to the Toll Bridge, where an extraordinary 4,000 cars are crossing every day. What is this doing to our children’s health?”
The call by campaigners comes as experts from the Royal Collges of Physicians and of Paediatrics and Child Health have today issued a report, warning that air pollution is contributing to about 40,000 early deaths a year in the UK. Professor Stephen Holgate, asthma expert at Southampton University who chaired the reporting group, told the BBC: “When you see cars piling up on the way to school taking their children, the fumes directly from the vehicle in front are being vented straight into the car behind, and exposing their child – and yet we are ignoring this.”.
Professor Holgate called for authorities to monitor pollution levels more closely, build new homes away from busy roads and consider closing particularly polluted roads at certain times. Emma Adams of the Bathampton Meadows Alliance, which is campaigning to stop the council building a park and ride on Bathampton Meadows, said: “we could all see for ourselves last week during half-term how much emptier the roads were into and around Bath. A significant proportion of traffic in Bath is school-related, and yet the council is not tackling this problem. Instead it’s proposing spending 9.7 million pounds of taxpayers money, when services are being cut, on building a park and ride that will do nothing to cut pollution, but in fact will bring more pollution into the Bathampton Valley basin.”
Emissions experts have warned that the proposed development of a 1,400 car park on Bathampton Meadows risks pushing Nitrogen Dioxide levels in Batheaston over the legal limit. “Councils have a statutory obligation to act if these levels are breached, or if there is a reasonable risk that they will be breached,” said lawyer and Bathampton resident, Annie Kilvington, who has studied the issue. “A planning authority cannot give permission to a development that will lead to a breach of the limit in the area of the development, and BANES knows this.”
Take To The Streets
Residents of Bath opposed to council proposals to build a huge Park and Ride on Bathampton Meadows will be taking to the streets tomorrow (Thursday 15th September) to call on the council not to approve the controversial plans. Campaigners say the demonstration, ahead of tomorrow’s full council meeting, will be their biggest protest yet. Residents will beat drums and sing a re-worded version of the Joni Mitchell class ‘big Yellow Taxi’ which they have made their anthem with Olympian Amy Williams, who is backing the campaign. (Recorded for posterity here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86AmikXfAT0)
Speakers at the council meeting will also be wearing masks, to demonstrate that they’re being gagged and as a symbol of the illegally high pollution levels in parts of the city, which even the council acknowledges a 4th P&R will do nothing to stop. Children from one of the local primary schools will also be bringing animals that they have made to display. Last November more than 200 members of the public turned out to show their opposition to the council plans, which led to BANES putting its decision on where to site Bath’s fourth P&R on hold.
Campaigner Fiona Powell, from Bathampton, said: “Sadly we now seem to be back to square one. BANES has consistently failed to show what benefit it would get from spending 12 million pounds of taxpayers money on concreting over the meadows, which are a hugely important resource for the whole city and for its designation as a World Heritage Site. “Instead it’s constantly changed the goal posts. Last year it said it needed a new P&R to reduce congestion and pollution in the city,” Ms Powell said. “But in the last few weeks, it’s at last acknowledged the truth, that this P&R will NOT reduce traffic or pollution in Bath. Instead it wants to spend millions of pounds on something that might reduce traffic and pollution in the future. This is no way to run a city like Bath.
The council has a legal duty to reduce air pollution. It’s also consistently failed to answer the question: why build another P&R when the P&Rs Bath already has are only half full.” Bath residents have instead called on BANES to improve public bus services into the city, and cycle routes. Campaigners joining the protest from Bathampton point out that they will have to drive into the city because the new Number 12 bus, that replaced the Number 4 bus from the village, no longer runs in the early evening. The demonstration will take place at 6pm outside the Guildhall.
For further information or to arrange interviews, please contact: Louise Hidalgo 07800 835 325
School Holiday Traffic Drop Research
There have been repeated calls from campaigners across the City (not just the East) for the Council to conduct proper research into the impact of the school run on traffic in Bath. The Council stopped collecting travel to school data as part of the school census when it ceased to be a mandatory field a few years ago and do not hold information about private schools at all. Collecting this again would tell them how many people travel by car to school and from this they should then understand what stops people using active travel instead so that they can support it properly and have a lasting positive impact on congestion.
We all see it – empty streets the moment that school is out and it cannot just be that parents take time off at the same time – parents get five weeks holiday at best and school holidays in state schools alone are thirteen weeks long, more in the private sector. These cars won’t use an East park and ride, just like the commuters who don’t use the existing ones today. Park and Ride usage in Bath is lowest when congestion is highest at only 24% fill according to Bath Hacked Full Year data. £10m should be spent on something that works.
The BMA has conducted two pieces of research so far. The presentation here is an automated traffic count carried out before and during the Easter holidays 2016 where morning traffic fell by 30%. The Toll Bridge management have told us that their revenues drop by 40% in the holidays and last month we stood and counted cars at the toll bridge – 48% of cars heading South over the toll bridge had children in uniform in them at around 8am. The people who should now be doing a comprehensive review are the Council.
This pdf sets out our school holiday traffic drop research Batheaston traffic counts 2016 – term time vs holidaysThe conclusion is that “Before BANES takes the very costly step of developing a large-scale Park and Ride to the East with its stated aim of reducing congestion, and given that existing P&R are so underused when daily congestion is highest, it must do further research into the effect of the school run before proceeding. Money should be spent on something that will actually ease congestion when it is most needed.”