Earlier today the Cambridge Area Joint Committee, a mix of City and County Councillors representing the interests of Cambridge city (for which I am a substitute member) met to discuss city-wide traffic management and environment issues.
The leader of the County Council, Cllr Nick Clarke, was in attendance at his first AJC representing the Conservative-controlled County Council.
The agenda was fairly straight forward and the meeting took a little over two hours (which isn't that bad to an AJC meeting - as Cllr Clarke pointed out the room is booked for four hours for the meeting). There was nothing really contentious and so there was only one or two members of the public in attendance. Not really a surprise but given the County councils pending review of AJCs it would have been nice if more people where there as it does seem to be the only AJC in the County which is actually fit for purpose and working!
Agenda item 4a (off-street parking) was the first real item with debate. Several members raised the issue of queuing to enter Park Street being a real issue during peak periods over the weekend (with long tailbacks interfering with the bus network amongst other things), comments were also raised regarding full day charging (£25) and officers clarified that the high charges were to discourage use for long periods, and finally the "grace period" was asked about and officers revealed that the grace period isn't fixed and varies across the cities car parks and even at different times of year. You have been warned!
When the vote was taken Cllr Clarke abstained and all other members (Labour and Liberal Democrat) voted in favour.
Agenda item 4b (On-street parking account) was looking like a fairly uncontentious item right up until the point where Cllr Clarke decided to raise the issue of why the AJC was even discussing it as it had no power of control over it.
The debate was lengthy and the gist was that committee members (except Cllr Clarke) believed that as the Committee looking strategically at traffic management across Cambridge it was right that it should express its view on how the surplus in the scheme should be spent - Cllr Clarke seemed of the view that the best place for local members (by which he specifically said County Councillors - not City Councillors) to raise their views was directly at Cabinet. I think Cllr Clark doesn't understand how the City works - the interdependency across Electoral Divisions seems to elude him. For example how Kings Hedges users would benefit from a Milton Road crossing opposite Downhams Lane (in East Chesterton) or how having additional Cycle Parking and/or a disabled bay outside the Milton Road shops (in West Chesterton) would be of direct benefit, etc.
Cllr Clarke seemed to adopt the view that democracy started and ended with local members and that committees, like the AJC, were a bad thing. There is, of course, a balance to be struck but I'm happy with where the AJC puts this balance and I do believe it benefits the people of Kings Hedges for certain decisions (like Radial road/bike routes) to be taken by a joint City/County committee.
The fact is if it didn't exist we'd need too invent it.
Cllr Rosenstiel proposed an ammendement, which I supported, which asked the County Cabinet to look at (not necessarily do, just look at) using some of the scheme surplus to reintrouduce the scrapped city centre shuttle bus.
Cllr Clarke voted against this amendment, all other Councillors (Labour and Liberal Democrat) voted in favour.
To be fair to Cllr Clarke he does seem to be generally trying to understand the city (which is in many ways better than the seemingly complete indifference that preceded him) but despite doing a few good things in Kings Hedges and Arbury I still feel that he just doesn't "get" the City. And judging by the number of Conservative City Councillours I can't help but feel that he isn't alone in his party on this one ...
Cllr Clarke also agued against this item even being on the Agenda.
Other items of note; ANPR was raised as an issue and a report requested from officers regarding the entire system (to assuage privacy concerns - which officers largely did in the meeting), a tour of the highways management centre is going to be arranged so members can see what goes on there, and the (Civil Parking Enforcement) CPE deficit is currently the subject of a review by government on how local councils can move out of permanent deficit.
This nicely brought us on to item 4c which dealt with the CPE account in detail. There was some concern expressed at the numbers (as they seemed to be different from those given in the previous section!), an offer was made to send round the CPE process flow diagram to clarify what was being covered by "There has been a procedural impropriety by the council" (down from 11% to 0%), it was agreed that a clarification would be sent by email.
Item 4d (South Area Parking plan) was uncontentious except that there was a request to add the
Cambridge Cycling Campaign to the list of member organisations (not just the forum), officers responded by saying that the members list was intended to just be elected members and the parking demand generators, AJC members could see this point but still felt that having the Cycling Campaign would help.
Item 5a the Ring Road and Radial Route Parking Review was next, members suggested that Milton Road and Histon Road would benefit from being in a Northern Area more closely aligned with the
North Area Committee. Milton road was the only radial route in Kings Hedges mentioned and the current plan is for no stopping at peak times, no waiting, loading or unloading, no parking on footways, no parking on highway verges, and a 24-hour clearest on all bus stops. All of those things I support, and no parking on verges is something I have been after for a while!
There was a debate about priorities and it was agreed that the new Northern area would be second (unfortunately I failed to note the positions of the other schemes - that will come in the minutes).
Agenda item 5b (Regent Street Toucan Crossing Upgrade) gave Cllr Clarke another opportunity to display his lack of understanding of the city. He raised the question of why the local member had not just decided this themselves rather than it coming to Committee. Officers pointed out that the local member had been consulted and Committee Members pointed out that the proposed upgrade was on one of the arterial cycle routes and so the change would have an effect on many divisions - in fact several of the Councillors sitting on the committee had used the route within the last few days.
Cllr Clarke, to the frustration of many of the Committee members present (including me) didn't seem to deviate from his point that taking decisions like this in committee will in some way "disenfranchise" local members.
Cllr Clarke then responded, rather darkly, to a comment from Cllr Nethsingha that the Committee had spent quite a lot of time on discussion whether or not issues should come here but saying that this "would be born in mind during the review [of AJC's]".
Cllr Brown (Chairing) attempted to help Cllr Clarke understand by comparing this cycling issue to issues we had discussed around Newmarket Road (i.e. strategic - bigger than a single division).
This issue was never going to be resolved in this Committee. Chair moved us on.
Agenda item 6 (Cambridge Centre Area Quality Bus Partnership) followed. Cllr Rosenstiel raised the issue of pollution (specifically nitrogen dioxide) in the City Centre and how buses with higher Euro ratings have lower emissions and asking if there was any plan to move providers like Stagecoach and Whippet onto buses with higher Euro ratings. Past progress has been quite good;
There was major investment a few years ago and officers did stress that it was unlikely that this would continue over the next few years.
The Committee questioned the reporting officer regarding "Low Floor Buses" as the current 90% of buses entering the central area are apparently "low floor". Officers clarified that this means that the bus is not just having a physical low floor but is also suitable for buggies, wheelchairs, etc - i.e. is suitable for disabled access (Cllr Rosenstiel had raised an issue with some low floor buses having a central column in the middle of the doorway and thus not being suitable for buggies).
It was pointed out that national legislation will require all single-decker buses to be low floor buses by 2016, double deckers by 2018, and coaches (which is going to be the most interesting to see!) by 2020.
The officer also pointed out that buses on the Guided Busway must be a minimum of Euro 4 and that the one hybrid bus currently being trialled by Stagecoach will be trailed by Whippet in a few weeks. This bus cost approximately £100,000 more than the already £120,000 cost of a Euro 4 bus. The fact that London has them was raised, and the officer confirmed that Transport for London paid for them - not the operators. As prices come down I'm sure hybrid (or maybe purely electric) buses will be the solution to Cambridge's air pollution issues but clearly at these prices it's not going to be this year or next year!
The final item of note, item 7 Programme Delivery Monitoring and Issues Update, followed and officers revealed that the list was going to be ripped up and tours arranged with local members and officers so that a definitive list of Division-based issues can be assembled.
That being said I raised the issue of the "missing" slow sign (that King's Hedges School agreed to pay for) on Northfield Avenue and the fact that there seems to have been some confusion regarding no-waiting on a bend in King's Hedges - I think this refers to Woodhead Drive but the table says Molewood Close which is actually in Arbury.
After a brief discussion of future Agenda items the meeting was closed.
