I want to thank everyone who attended the public meeting and HIHub for covering the meeting and anyone who has contacted me. This leads me to want to address a few issues and some points in the HiHub article which I think could be misconstrued. I’m not a defender of the county council’s actions but as a councillor I have quite a lot of knowledge.

Style of fencing – **** EDITED

Hihub suggests that we will be getting 1.5m high metal fencing, effectively along the length of the busway separating the maintenance track from the busway. I don’t think this is correct because I don’t think the county council have confirmed what the fencing would be. They said the fencing would be 1.5m high and failed to provide any images.

I suspect it won’t be metal fencing because the fencing at Trumpington in their highest priority safety location is metal. It is extremely expensive but only waist height. By deduction I would be very surprised if 1.5m high fencing is metal. That said the county council have not provided images and people will always fear the worst. ****EDIT I am now hearing rumours that it might be tall metal fencing. The main issue is the failure to communicate and the council’s inability to stick to commitments such as providing a date for the next meeting EDIT****

Impact on nature

Again due to an absence of images we can’t evaluate the impact on nature. A single image might allay all concerns.

Cost

Again I think it is unclear quite how the money is being allocated, and that is a good thing as the council doesn’t want to tell providers how much there is to spend. The council wants to get the best value fencing.

Crossing points

We got a commitment from the county council to create a single additional crossing point, but there is an opportunity for negotiation and there are two public right of way applications being determined which go over the busway which will affect things.

HiHub is right that there the council identified 9 crossing points but the situation is complicated. On the Histon side there are two very well used clear ‘informal crossing points’ which will have to be either regularised and new crossings created or closed permanently (these are the locations of the public right of way applications). The council is adamant that it will start off by completely closing these crossing points and then look to reinstate a single crossing point.

A cut through from Vision Park will be closed permanently I am certain and I don’t think that can be argued for.

The situation in Impington near the lakes is far more complex. I helped Helena Perry draw a public map of this area. There are some real issues for the local campaign for access here. That all the crossing points go over the busway to private land is a real problem as any investment in formalised crossings could be made redundant by a private landowner closing off access. Currently there are lots of effectively holes in the hedge line. If we are going to get access across the busway in this vicinity we will need to start talking to landowners about permanent access rights or a long term commitment to access as a matter of urgency. Please get in touch if you can help with these conversations.

No date or budget has been set for the formal crossing point which is extremely non ideal.

It is my assessment that we should continue fighting for access.

Failure to commit to date or meet deadlines

The failure to commit to dates and meet deadlines is an ongoing shortcoming of the county council. I was promised that this meeting would happen in July. I paused my efforts over the summer holidays but had to escalate the issue to the Chief Executive to get the public meeting. The county council acknowledge this breaks trust but then don’t solve the problem. This is highly frustrating.

Here are some other issues raised with me this week.

Why did the county council sign off the busway if it wasn’t safe.

It is complicated. This is the only busway of this length in the country and it is has only become apparent latterly after prosecution how the HSE wanted it regulated.  If there was specific legislation about things like fences it would have been a lot easier.  So the county council signed it off because they believed it to be safe.

Since the High court action taken by the HSE against the county council this year following the deaths of 3 people on the busway the HSE have been a bit more active. They have issued specific enforcement notices in response to observed behaviours witnessed on the busway but still without specifying the specific control measures needed. ie the county council has to work out what they are expected to do and the HSE can retrospectively tell them they should have done more but will not provide guidance at the time.

The county council’s safety culture was found to be wanting historically

In the period 2010 to 2021 the county council took a more lax attitude to safety than they should have done.  Safety notices from the HSE were not taken seriously and it was treated more like a road than how the HSE expects places it regulates to be treated.

In 2021 the council administration changed and went to Lib Dem/ Labour/ Independent from Conservative. There was also a change in Chief Executive.   This is part of an ongoing approach to transform the safety culture around the busway.

Why was the busway signed off when there is so much flooding

In terms of the flooding again it is complicated. As I understand it the current busway design was built on the assumption of about 5 days of flooding a year.  The extent of the flooding has been far worse than anticipated both as a consequence of heavier annual rainfall and also the Environment agency’s failure to maintain either St Ives or Brownshill Sluices properly, so water backs up for months on end during winter in a way that was never expected.   

The maintenance track was built below the level of the busway because the Environment Agency demanded that if it was raised to busway height there would have to be offsetting to match the volume of material used to build up the maintenance track within the flood plain, ie they would have to buy additional land to create the same volume of flood plain lost by building up the maintenance track (or something like that).  This would have been costly and was deemed to not be necessary as modelling indicated just 5 days a year of flood related closure annually.  Had the extent of flooding actually experienced been understood at the time different decisions may have been made but things have not played out that way. 

It is my view as a councillor who has spent a lot of time on busway issues that the safety culture has improved, but it is complicated. I don’t think a fight to stop fencing the busway is winnable but I think adding additional safety measures such as lighting and additional crossing points is a fight worth having.