On Thursday and Friday of last week the traffic situation in Sheffield City Centre was as bad as I can remember it.

Some people I spoke to on Friday morning reported setting off from work at 5:30pm and not leaving the city centre until close to 8pm.

It seems to me as though SCC have created the situation where the entire ring road grounds to a halt as soon as one single accident occurs.

Whereas in the past there were multiple routes out of the city centre, they have now been vastly reduced, creating the situation where it is difficult to avoid trabelling on the inner ring road at some point.

I wasn't in Sheffield when the Supertram system was built (I arrived as a student in 1995, I'm originally from Loughborough, but now consider myself a naturalised Sheffielder, although never a Yorkshireman) but I can't imagine it would even be possible to build the next phases of the tram system without bring absolute traffic chaos and misery to drivers for months on end.

Even if the work was carried out during the summer months when traffic is at it's lightest there would be no way I can see it working.

My other thought is that two major new developments are due to be built next to the inner ring road (CityGate and Velocity Tower). I have no idea how good the access to this site is but is they allow construction traffic an entrance directly from the ring road this will lead to more chaos.

Apologies if I sound like someone from Sheffield Forum, that wasn't my intention. I really want to see the extensions to the supertram and new skyscrapers built. I'd just like to avoid too much misery in the process.

Hi Barry,
Funny thing is for many years this has happened.
Everytime we have a bit of snow or a sudden temprature drop with ice, the whole of sheffield grinds to a complete stop.
There are 3 reasons for this.
1) The hilly nature of the city
2) Blocked off rat runs leave no alternative way around blockages
3) Poor drivers

Even 18 years ago when I lived on ecclesall road, I remember the road like sheet ice and cars sliding all over the place. It was lethal.

My boss lives at Hathersage. Near christmas or in january when we get the worst of the ice, he often takes ages to get home. One year it took him 2 hours to get from Heeley to Parkhead.

While it would be easy to blame the Council for this, most of it is down to the sheer volume of cars. With every driver making 50 extra journeys, delivering christmas cards to relatives and christmas shopping etc...

If you want to get really mad about traffic congestion, I believe the time to do it is during January when the extra Christmas traffic has dissapeared.

I'm not one for blaming the authorities everytime something goes wrong, but this really is a major planning failure on the part of the city council, and not just this one but their predecessors as well.

In the early nineties they deliberatly started shutting down major through-routes across the city centre to force through traffic onto the ring road. You used to be able to drive from arundel gate onto angel street, charter square to furnival square, church st to west st, furnival gate down to sheaf sq etc etc- loads was shut off.

How on earth did they ever think that the capacity of the ring road would just take all that extra traffic with ever growing car usage. When something gets stuck, there is nowhere else to go now. They should widen the IRR (which will never happen due to the cost and the disruption) or reopen some of the old throughroutes and/or have on the ground traffic officers to sort out any crisis.

Im not sure that there is any evidence that major construction projects have much impact on this, with the obvious exception being the new IRR around west bar. I dont think new buildings cause this mess.

Alfie,
that is an extremely simplistic view. In the 1960s you could drive down the moor and fargate, But are you arguing that pedestrianising was an error of judgement too?

At the moment the inner ring road is inadequate because it is incomplete. When it is done next year, then I expect that it will function better and there will be less bottlenecks on the Hanover way section.

I don't know how you can argue that the inner ring road cannot take all the traffic, when it is a broad dual carriageway with 2 lanes in either direction and large roundabouts. The old through routes you mentioned Arundel gate - Angel street, were not proper dual carriageways and were always lined with loads of busses. Busses don't go on the Inner ring road. The inner ring road IS a bigger capacity road.

Incidentally the section along Hanover and St Mary's, looks to me like it could be widened, because I believe that it was originally designed like that with 6 lanes, but downgraded. If you look at the central reservation it is enormous, and there is a large grass verge at either side and nothing built next to the roadway. It might well be done in the future, but at present I don't believe there would be much advantage in doing so because the problems occur with the junctions with the arterial roads, they are the principal cause of the tailbacks.
Another pinch point, probably the final one on the Inner ring road, is the Royal Standard Pub. It causes the road to narrow. It is a shame but the pub has to go if that section is ever to be effective.
Also there are lots of shunts in that area, due to the funnelling of 2 lanes into one each way. I have personally seen a car written off there, and every week there is the remains of another collision.

It will be interesting to see how the IRR section by the station works. This is of course a big compromise as many old plans showed a wider, less cluttered route in the bank at the back of the station, in a cutting or tunnel. It is a real shame that the pedestrian crossing at the station gateway is there. But I am willing to be proved wrong.

Another pinch point, probably the final one on the Inner ring road, is the Royal Standard Pub. It causes the road to narrow. It is a shame but the pub has to go if that section is ever to be effective.
Also there are lots of shunts in that area, due to the funnelling of 2 lanes into one each way. I have personally seen a car written off there, and every week there is the remains of another collision.

All they have to do here is ever so slightly reduce the size of the pedestrian island outside the Royal Standard Pub and repaint the lanes so there are two lanes heading towards the Bramall Lane roundabout from Granville Square and one lane for those heading towards Granville Square from the Bramall Lane roundabout. Its such a simple solution and would cost next to nothing to implement. I did mention this to a transport planner at SCC but the guy is a prize arsehole who didnt seem to like planning students with sensible ideas.

All they have to do here is ever so slightly reduce the size of the pedestrian island outside the Royal Standard Pub and repaint the lanes so there are two lanes heading towards the Bramall Lane roundabout from Granville Square and one lane for those heading towards Granville Square from the Bramall Lane roundabout. Its such a simple solution and would cost next to nothing to implement. I did mention this to a transport planner at SCC but the guy is a prize arsehole who didnt seem to like planning students with sensible ideas.

Well I will have a look at your suggestion next time I am down there.
Judging by the adjacent properties to the pub, it seems to me that a big wide road is planned that matches the next bit westwards. I notice that the widened section further west has an inormous bank on the south side. I always wondered if this was a sound baffle to muffle the roadway noise from the residential area or the remains of a flattened terrace, or reserved land kept by the city for future road widening.

While the royal standard is a farely attractive pub, it isn't particularly historically interesting for a pub built in 1845 and it has had a compulsory purchase order hanging over it since about 1980, leaving it in Limbo for most of the last 26 years. However it would be wonderful if they could rebuild it further back

RE: Blocked off routes - This was a simple mistake on the part of the council if you ask me, and I'm pretty sure Dinp has mentioned the same problem on here before - Arundel Gate, Charter Row and other through routes were downsized and renovated long before the sections of the inner ring road were complete. Arundel Gate was narrowed before the the work at Sheaf Square outside the station and Granville circularitary system were complete - The reduction of capacity and other traffic reducing measures aroung the castlegate area and the wicker have been in place since the early 90's - and yet the northern inner ring road is only just nearing completion.

Dean - The only person I've ever met from SCC transport department was a fine chap - very helpful, however I can easily beleive that many a bitter oldschool planner there would rather mess things up than swallow their pride and work with students/new planners or even the public. Perhaps thats just a cynical view though.

All they have to do here is ever so slightly reduce the size of the pedestrian island outside the Royal Standard Pub and repaint the lanes so there are two lanes heading towards the Bramall Lane roundabout from Granville Square and one lane for those heading towards Granville Square from the Bramall Lane roundabout. Its such a simple solution and would cost next to nothing to implement. I did mention this to a transport planner at SCC but the guy is a prize arsehole who didnt seem to like planning students with sensible ideas.

Couldn't agree with you more. There are already two lanes going anticlockwise along Shoreham Street. There's room for three outside the Standard (currently), so surely it would be better to have one anti and two clockwise rather than the other way round. Making 3 anti & 2 clock rather than 4 & 1.

RE: Blocked off routes - This was a simple mistake on the part of the council if you ask me, and I'm pretty sure Dinp has mentioned the same problem on here before - Arundel Gate, Charter Row and other through routes were downsized and renovated long before the sections of the inner ring road were complete. Arundel Gate was narrowed before the the work at Sheaf Square outside the station and Granville circularitary system were complete - The reduction of capacity and other traffic reducing measures aroung the castlegate area and the wicker have been in place since the early 90's - and yet the northern inner ring road is only just nearing completion.

Dean - The only person I've ever met from SCC transport department was a fine chap - very helpful, however I can easily beleive that many a bitter oldschool planner there would rather mess things up than swallow their pride and work with students/new planners or even the public. Perhaps thats just a cynical view though.

Andrew, Hopefully you met a different chap to the one who boasted about wasting 6 months time and money on the issue of the odd pedestrian barrier on Eyre Street, which is why the scheme took as long as it did.

Regarding the problem at the Royal Standard pub on St Marys Road, his solution was to buy land to the front of the pub to create the extra lane, which is when I gave him my suggestion.

Removing some of the Royal Standard's forecourt could have disastrous effects on pedestrian/traffic safety, particularly on match days as it is a United pub and crowds gather outside. Not only that, but traffic would, in effect, have to wiggle through a small chicaned section outside the pub.

Now having seen first hand how stingy highway engineers are with road widths these days, when large vehicles tackle this chicane section, they will squash unsuspecting vehicles in the opposite lane (Charter Row/Fitzwilliam Street/Moorfoot lights anyone??). Implementing my solution, restricting access to/from Edmund Road where necessary would be cheaper, safer and wouldn't require a CPO.

If they can save the massive historical frontages of a building like the ones at the top of Fargate and the one next to Wickes.
Why the hell can't they carefully dismantle and preserve the front of the royal standard pub, Move it back 10 yards (or other nearby location) and rebuild it on to a brand new modern shell.

Result,
Up to date pub which retains the style and tradition of the original one.
No problem with road widening, or safety to pedestrians or Blades fans on match days.

And the pub would for the first time in decades have a secure future, everyone's happy...

If you look here on the Google sattelite map
Detail of St Mary's Road (http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=st+mary%27s+road,+sheffield&sll=53.098145,-2.443696&sspn=9.123482,18.896484&ie=UTF8&z=17&ll=53.373351,-1.466192&spn=0.004423,0.012746&t=k&om=1)

You can see how massive the western section of St Mary's road is compared with the Eastern End.
And it is also obvious why there are so many accidents. It is like the M1 being funnelled onto London road, such a big mismatch.

If they can save the massive historical frontages of a building like the ones at the top of Fargate and the one next to Wickes.
Why the hell can't they carefully dismantle and preserve the front of the royal standard pub, Move it back 10 yards (or other nearby location) and rebuild it on to a brand new modern shell.
.


I think it can be summed up in a couple of words; cost and bloodymindedness.

They can move buildings quite easily I believe, one of my relatives used to be a regular at a Methodist chapel which had to be sold. Some people from an American University brought it and moved it brick by brick to Kansas and re-erected it!

I think it can be summed up in a couple of words; cost and bloodymindedness.

They can move buildings quite easily I believe, one of my relatives used to be a regular at a Methodist chapel which had to be sold. Some people from an American University brought it and moved it brick by brick to Kansas and re-erected it!

Thing is though, a church you would want to preserve the whole building, the alter, the pulpit, the pews, the windows. Whereas this pub, the only part of the building which needs saving is the front wall with its stone window frames etc. You don't need the old inside at all. It would probably benefit to start with a completely new structure otherwise, with modern equipment / heat and sound insulation built in right from the start. The room with the pool table can be the exact size, the whole ground floor can have disabled access.

i think there are actually plans to widen the road there, ive heard that the tables will be moved from the front of the Standard to the side and the road be widened. They can fit another lane in without moving the pub, just the tables

i think there are actually plans to widen the road there, ive heard that the tables will be moved from the front of the Standard to the side and the road be widened. They can fit another lane in without moving the pub, just the tables

http://www.sheffield.gov.uk/roads-and-transport/schemes-projects/granville-gyratory-phase-3-traffic-proposals

Looks like they missed the start date though. Guess getting hold of the land must be slowing it down.

I know it's not really to do with construction, but

Region wins £38m transport boost
SOUTH Yorkshire is to get more than £38 million for transport improvements from the Government next year, it was announced today.
Transport Secretary Douglas Alexander announced the cash settlement as part of £156 million allocation for the Yorkshire and the Humber region.
The money is given to local authorities each year to help them deliver transport improvements in their communities.
Of the South Yorkshire cash around £15 million will be spent on maintenance and the rest on developing new schemes like new road safety measures, better street lighting, road maintenance, park and ride facilities and cycle lanes.
Mr Alexander held up Sheffield's new inner ring road as one example of the success in the Yorkshire and the Humber region.
The £62 million, eight-mile dual carriageway is due to be completed next year. It will help regeneration by diverting traffic from the city centre and speeding up journey times.
But the settlement could have been better still if the county had scored more highly on its new plan for transport.
The Government said South Yorkshire new Local Transport Plan was only 'fair', one of the worst in Yorkshire and the Humber.
This means it missed out on the additional funding it would have got if it had been classed as 'good' or 'excellent.'

I'm guessing some will be spent on bringing some of the worst roads up to scratch.

The last few line's don't sound too good though.

But the settlement could have been better still if the county had scored more highly on its new plan for transport.
The Government said South Yorkshire new Local Transport Plan was only 'fair', one of the worst in Yorkshire and the Humber.


Yeah,
does anyone know what was wrong with the plan?
Was it just because they had set so much plans on supertram extensions, without proper public support?

If they can save the massive historical frontages of a building like the ones at the top of Fargate and the one next to Wickes.
Why the hell can't they carefully dismantle and preserve the front of the royal standard pub, Move it back 10 yards (or other nearby location) and rebuild it on to a brand new modern shell.

Result,
Up to date pub which retains the style and tradition of the original one.
No problem with road widening, or safety to pedestrians or Blades fans on match days.

And the pub would for the first time in decades have a secure future, everyone's happy...

If you look here on the Google sattelite map
Detail of St Mary's Road (http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=st+mary%27s+road,+sheffield&sll=53.098145,-2.443696&sspn=9.123482,18.896484&ie=UTF8&z=17&ll=53.373351,-1.466192&spn=0.004423,0.012746&t=k&om=1)

You can see how massive the western section of St Mary's road is compared with the Eastern End.
And it is also obvious why there are so many accidents. It is like the M1 being funnelled onto London road, such a big mismatch.

Thanks for providing the link to that map, ive used it to make a mock up of my suggestion. Here's how the road is at present...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/dinp83/stmarysnow.jpg

And here is it if I had my way. Note the new lane arrangement. Just scraping a tiny bit from the triangle shaped pedestrian island will pretty much solve the problem here...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/dinp83/stmarysroadnew.jpg

I see what you are saying. And I agree that the roadway in front of the pub needs only to be westbound as you have indicated.

However if you compare your proposed scheme to the carriageway further west, you might agree with me that the main problem isn't solved.

The next property along is a former garage / merchants, and I am expecting it to be used up in the next phase of the scheme, to complete the alignments of st mary's road from the bramall lane roundabout.

So long as there are two lanes running from Granville Square to the Bramall Lane roundabout I think that's all you realistically need to do as it will ease traffic congestion at Granville Square right back to the station car park, where currently all the ring road traffic is hemmed into one lane.

I don't think it would make much of a difference if they did demolish the former garage site on St Marys Road as the traffic would still grind to a halt at the Bramall Lane roundabout anyway - in my view its about relieving the pressure at Granville Square by making an extra lane, which will allow traffic using the Gyratory System in that area to flow more easily. The Bramall Lane and Moore Street roundabouts are a whole new problem entirely.

If we'd have talked about this earlier dean I'd have talked to the Council Transport planning department about doing a study into the effects of your suggestions as my Consultancy project!!

who am i kidding, they wouldn't even have returned my calls, let alone let me do it.

If we'd have talked about this earlier dean I'd have talked to the Council Transport planning department about doing a study into the effects of your suggestions as my Consultancy project!!

who am i kidding, they wouldn't even have returned my calls, let alone let me do it.

I expect that thoughts about future road suggestions are kept very private. If the public get an idea that some property might be compulsarily purchased, it could ruin many people's lives.

Just listen to the people who suffered in the Heeley Bypass disaster. Some unable to move for 25 years, all for a road scheme which was never started. Even now there is a huge swathe of green land where a thriving community once was.

And a few people still harbouring a little anger about how it was handled.

I must say I'm not familiar with the ins and outs of Heeley Bypass, though i know of it. I have looked at Heeley on a map and thought parts of it looked abit empty.

Any other sources of info muddycoffee, i'd be interested to read some more.

I don't think it would make much of a difference if they did demolish the former garage site on St Marys Road as the traffic would still grind to a halt at the Bramall Lane roundabout anyway - in my view its about relieving the pressure at Granville Square by making an extra lane, which will allow traffic using the Gyratory System in that area to flow more easily. The Bramall Lane and Moore Street roundabouts are a whole new problem entirely.


In my opinion, the problem with Bramall Lane roundabout is, on the Bramall Lane side, the pedestrian crossing outside the BP, which at rush hour is heavily used and causes traffic to back up over the roundabout thus stopping flow in several directions - there is an underpass for pedestrians, make this safer and get rid of the overground crossings; and on the Eyre Street side, the degrading of the dual carriageway without alternative routes, causing traffic again to queue onto the roundabout when busy and stop the roundabout.

With Moore Street roundabout, the traffic trying to get onto Charter Row has been prevented from doing so by the council degrading it from a dual carriageway, again with no alternative routes in place. This causes the traffic to queue over the roundabout and is (in my opinion) the main reason that Hanover Way heading towards Moore Street is so busy at rush hour.

In my opinion, the problem with Bramall Lane roundabout is, on the Bramall Lane side, the pedestrian crossing outside the BP, which at rush hour is heavily used and causes traffic to back up over the roundabout thus stopping flow in several directions - there is an underpass for pedestrians, make this safer and get rid of the overground crossings; and on the Eyre Street side, the degrading of the dual carriageway without alternative routes, causing traffic again to queue onto the roundabout when busy and stop the roundabout.

With Moore Street roundabout, the traffic trying to get onto Charter Row has been prevented from doing so by the council degrading it from a dual carriageway, again with no alternative routes in place. This causes the traffic to queue over the roundabout and is (in my opinion) the main reason that Hanover Way heading towards Moore Street is so busy at rush hour.

I agree with most of that but the Moore Street roundabout as far as i can see doesn't get blocked on the evening rush hour, it's the morning rush hour that affects this but it moves on really quick causing minimal promlems imo. I think the solution on this roundabout would be as simple to just remove the traffic lights that only work at rush hour. They cause most of the queues and often when on red it seems like the roads on and off the roundabout are too as there are no cars crossing it.

Even better they could make use of the pedestrian underpass so cars following the ring road could go under the roundabout. I'm not sure what the pedestrians (like me) would do though.

I must admit I haven't been on that route in a few months as I now live at the other end of town but I used to commute through it daily and would regularly get stuck coming down Hanover Way, and it would almost always be cars queueing to get onto Charter Row that caused it and also cars queuing down to get to St Mary's Gate and ultimately Sheaf Street/Park Square.

Hopefully traffic will be reduced on these routes once the ring road is fully complete, though I think the council were very shortsighted in reducing road capacities on some of these routes before the completion.

I have always been in favour of traffic going on the main route (ie. the ring road) being pushed over or under the roundabout therefore massively reducing congestion on the roundabouts. A traffic underpass worked very well (from my experiences) on Eyre Street/Arundel Gate when one used to be there.

As for what pedestrians would do, they could then happily put overground crossings in place as the traffic would be massively reduced and so these crossings would not cause traffic issues like they currently do.

I must say I'm not familiar with the ins and outs of Heeley Bypass, though i know of it. I have looked at Heeley on a map and thought parts of it looked abit empty.

Any other sources of info muddycoffee, i'd be interested to read some more.

There is quite a bit of debate on Sheffield Forum, but it is off line at the moment. But to summerise.
The city had a big plan to put a network of urban motorways through the city. And basically, Queens road and Bramall lane were to be dual carriageways which fed on down the hill over the railway bridge behind halfords, and along the back of the river until the other side of the White Lion pub, where it rejoined the original A61 route to continue up Chesterfield Road.

The main problem is that this plan was first examined soon after the War, and many of the houses at heeley in the proposed path were seen to be substandard.

Unfortunately the community spirit in that area was very strong and a 25 year long campaign was waged against the council to stop the Heeley Bypass. Due to the lengthy campaign, people who owned their homes in the affected area were unable to sell or move, because the value had dropped to a fraction of the market value.
Also people who were tennants, lived in houses which were condemned and had no maintenence or improvement for years.

One version of the end of the Heeley Bypass saga is that some of the cleared land was cultivated by a local group and became the Heeley City Farm. This eventually got some form of protection, halted the plan completely. That was about 25 years ago and there was a programme on Radio 4 about it last year.

As a supplimentary,
Haydn has done a section about the Heely Bypass Here :-
http://www.d-zyne.demon.co.uk/srp-heeley_bypass.htm

Also it seems that there were plans for a large roundabout at the bottom of Carterknowle road. In the 70s there was a huge display for residents set up with the proposals in the area. It seems that there was a whole block intended for compulsory purchase including the Abbey Glen Laundry, the plans included a new link road and overpass over the sheaf towards the southern end of the heeley bypass.

Interestingly even today there is much evidence of the scheme. The whole of the west side of the top section of bramall lane is carparks with the building line kept right back, to accommodate the dualled road. Only the two old pubs were left. Even the new block of flats keep to this line, presumably in case the supertram ever gets extended down here. At the bramhall lane roundabout the begginning of the lane is a few yards of Dual Carriageway. This is the only bit of this bypass ever built.

It is interesting to consider the current layout of Queens road. It is such a wide road it is like an urban motorway anyhow. When the new B&Q and the Queens road retail units were developed, the road was widened, but it suddenly narrows again at the river crossing where the old terraced housing still stands. Seems to me that the feared dual carriageway is stealthily and slowly being built. Just this year a section of the old terraced housing was demolished. I wonder how long the rest will last..

I must admit I haven't been on that route in a few months as I now live at the other end of town but I used to commute through it daily and would regularly get stuck coming down Hanover Way, and it would almost always be cars queueing to get onto Charter Row that caused it and also cars queuing down to get to St Mary's Gate and ultimately Sheaf Street/Park Square.

Hopefully traffic will be reduced on these routes once the ring road is fully complete, though I think the council were very shortsighted in reducing road capacities on some of these routes before the completion.

I have always been in favour of traffic going on the main route (ie. the ring road) being pushed over or under the roundabout therefore massively reducing congestion on the roundabouts. A traffic underpass worked very well (from my experiences) on Eyre Street/Arundel Gate when one used to be there.

As for what pedestrians would do, they could then happily put overground crossings in place as the traffic would be massively reduced and so these crossings would not cause traffic issues like they currently do.

I agree the ring road should go in a tunnel if you're not exiting. Would be good to do the same from Hanover Way to other side of university roundabout.

Looking at the new section of the IRR the current plan is to get pedestrians across the main roads with crossings. I wish they'd put certain sections in a cutting / tunnel to allow pedestrians to have more control of the ground level. It also allows traffic to flow much better. Sheaf Square is a perfect example.

It seemed to work (for traffic) in Brum when I worked there, but the ring road was (and still is) a nightmare for pedestrians. You have to take a baffling array of subways/bridges with no idea where you're heading to. Quality post war design...

Soupcon, birmingham is certainly one of the great adverts for NOT strapping a dual carriageway around the very heart of your city - the equivalent in Sheffield I think would have been the inner circle being complteted - arundel gate, moorhead and the market roads were part of this but I have aleaflet which shows the full extent of the road - it would have come round the back of the cathederal and city hall and a dual carriageway would have come down where the fire station is now, right across division street and west street.

Muddycoffee - very interesting points about a) the way these so called 'cancelled' schemes still manage to ease their way into existence and b) the way you can see cleared land or areas which look ready to be demolished for such schemes but never were.

I agree the ring road should go in a tunnel if you're not exiting. Would be good to do the same from Hanover Way to other side of university roundabout.

Definately. They managed to do it for the tram so why not for cars!

I have a leaflet which shows the full extent of the road - it would have come round the back of the cathederal and city hall and a dual carriageway would have come down where the fire station is now, right across division street and west street..

You may have missed the detail that the section which goes from Broad Lane to Charter square was to be an underground road tunnel.

I have studied these sites and I am convinced that the shape of the roundabout at charter square is like a D because the tunnels were to emerge there. The back section of the D is elevated very high, and I like to think that the road would emerge beneath at ground level. Although I have been told it was more likely it would have emerged above where the car park still is. Probably the reason the site wasn't built on for so many years.

The other end of the tunnel was to terminate at a roundabout On broad lane / Garden Street / Bailey lane. You can still see the alignments of the buildings to allow the siting of the roundabout. My estimation is that the tunnel was to emerge in a mouth half way down Bailey Lane, a road which has a very steep gradient along part of its length.

Also Broad Lane itself was earmarked for considerable widening, and you can still see that the building line along the north edge has been kept well back from the roadway, and has remained cobbled, it has been left as a carpark for many decades.

Even better they could make use of the pedestrian underpass so cars following the ring road could go under the roundabout. I'm not sure what the pedestrians (like me) would do though.

I mentioned this before (well, a grade-separated IRR) and was shot down citing the huge amounts of land needed. I mean, yea, nice idea, but CPO's would be needed to make the slip-road to the roundabouts for those who did want to turn off the ring road...

It would be good, but completely unrealistic if the whole of hanover way and st mary's road was put in a big cutting. Then pedestrians could just walk into town. And the bus route down london road wouldn't have to stop just drive over the top to moorfoot.

This is more of a rant than anything else but here goes.

Background
There was a story on Look L**ds the other day stating that Sheffield is currently THE fastest growing city in the country. We know this could be nonsense, and a lot of cities claim this, but either way, we all know Sheff is booming.

Rant
I work at a school in Parson Cross and live in Norton Lees (7 miles approx). On 4 separate occasions since the start of the school year, it has taken me more than 2 hours to get home by car! On 3 of these occasions, upon returning home, I have found out that the traffic mayhem was caused by 1, yes 1, car or car with a trailer that had broken down, and miles away from my route home. Tonight, my journey was made worse by the NEW roundabout at the end of shalesmoor, supposedly there to improve things, but clearly not able to cope with the volume of traffic.

Point
How on earth can Sheff maintain its growth, attract businesses, attract new developments if we cant even move traffic around when 1 car breaks down!

We can dream about new developments all we like, but unless the city council comes up with a plan to sort this out, our city will grind to a halt, developments will cease, and the current influx of new people will go elsewhere. The IRR is not the answer at the rate the city is growing.

We should be/are competing with Manchester, Birmingham, L**ds and Liverpool for various investments, developments etc, but ALL of these cities have a far superior road infrastructure to ours. Unless SCC comes up with a plan quickly, we will be competing with second or third teir cities such as Nottingham, Bradford, Hull etc.

I will finish by saying again the IRR will not solve this.

Rant over:blahblah:

I think once it's complete, the IRR WILL solve a lot of the problems, but it's not gonna solve everything.

I think the councils's 5 year transport plan is quite inadequate. It seems to mostly be about cycle and walking routes. I think the council (as does the government at this time) needs to make some bold move's to sort out Sheffield's trasport problems, cause it's not gonna be something that can be sorted by little bit's here and there.

If we could get a bit more control over public transport, that might help aswell. (There was an advert on the radio a while back, saying that if everyone used public transport to get to work once a week, it would cut congestion by something like 25%).

The council need to stop their irrational anti-car tactics and help to ease the passage of cars through/around the city, not hinder them.

People want to drive cars, and you will not tempt the majority onto inferior public transport by making car driving hell. Improve public transport and some people will switch, but don't try and force them. And don't do it at the expense of the motorist.

Yes, every city has bad congestion, but other city's try and help the situation - the fact is that SCC has created this mess by closing roads for no reason along with other anti-car measures. You cannot force all the traffic onto a single route and expect it to be problem free. Hence a single car bringing the entire city to a stop.

The council need to stop their irrational anti-car tactics and help to ease the passage of cars through/around the city, not hinder them.

People want to drive cars, and you will not tempt the majority onto inferior public transport by making car driving hell. Improve public transport and some people will switch, but don't try and force them. And don't do it at the expense of the motorist.

Yes, every city has bad congestion, but other city's try and help the situation - the fact is that SCC has created this mess by closing roads for no reason along with other anti-car measures. You cannot force all the traffic onto a single route and expect it to be problem free. Hence a single car bringing the entire city to a stop.

They have to follow central government transport policies to get people out of cars and onto bicycles and busses or they don't get any funding.

Yes, but there are other ways of doing this. Other city's manage to do this without irrational use of traffic lights, bus lanes and one-way streets.

For a start, improve the quality, reliability and cost-effectiveness of public transport and a lot of people will see it as more desirable. Bus lanes and the tram are not the answer to all the public transport issues - they alone will not suddenyl make it more desireable.

I know people who were die-hard users of public transport, but the fare rises and unreliability has made them reconsider, and some have switched to using cars. This is the reverse of what the council wants.

Public transport needs to be integrated with private vehicle use. People will always want/need to use a car, and simply making their life difficult will not top this - it will just cause chaos liek we witness regularly.

^^@Mudddycoffee, the council got minimal funding from the government for it's current transport policy, cause central government thought it was poor and inadequate.

I agree with a lot of what you say keith, but I think extention's to the tram system will help. Trams are a much more comfortable andd generally reliable form of transport, and as has been seen in Nottingham, well thought through systems can releive a great deal of traffic.

Agreed, tram extensions would help, but ONLY if the motorist was allowed to go about their business too, otherwise when traffic builds up due to poor road planning, the tram stops too.

Whatever happened with the proposed tram extensions? Did we lose out on the money? Or did the council decide against them.

I think the council are to blame for not making a good enough case for extending the tramways. My understaning is they needed the go ahead from central government and they failed to get it ( along with funding ). This is doubly annoying as..
1) Other cities succeded in getting go ahead for tram extentions at the same time e.g. Manchester and Nottingham
2) The supertram network covers a tiny part of the city/county and we are all subsidising it wether we can use it or not. I can't I don't go anywhere near it.

I think that the route to rotherham centre would have been very succesful as driving between the Rotherham and sheffield centres is a total and utter gridlock nightmare during rushhours. The tram would use so much former railway bed that it would hardly be affected by the road traffic at all. From my point of view it is begging to happen and the sooner the better. There are also lots of people who work at meadowhall, and along attercliffe who live in rotherham.

The new waverly estate has been planned with a tram extension in mind to join up with nunnery. If this line is commissioned along with the new houses and apartments, then some people would never even need a car at all.

As has been stated before, a tram extension from Midland Station along the rail route all the way up Chesterfield Rd / Abbeydale Rd would be relatively cheap because much of the line bed is already in place. Alternatively, the reopening of the old station at Heeley and the construction of a couple of new stations for commuter trains would surely ease the conjestion to the south west of the city, and may even have a knock-on effect at Woodseats. If trains can stop at Dore and Dronfield, surely a couple of rush-hour-only stops along Abbeydale Rd could be possible. Manchester and Leeds both have plenty of urban train stops used by commuters - why not Sheffield? We have the lines, but precious few urban stations.

Also, regarding the council's 'prioritisation' of cycle routes - unfortunately, Sheffield does not have the topography of Oxford or Amsterdam. There are simply too many hills. However, the main valley routes into the city are very viable, and (in an ideal world) would benefit from cycle paths that take cycles away from road traffic, as opposed to lines painted on the sides of the road.