Deansgate Cycle Slalom

 Deansgate is famous for it's on-street sports events and Manchester City Council seem hell bent on inventing a new one, cycle slalom.

The new northbound cycle lane weaves it's way between pavement and a forest of bollards with priority being given to vehicle parking, loading bays and traffic coming out of side streets.

What's wrong with building cycle lanes that actually go in a straight line along a straight road?

Southbound you are running with the traffic negotiating badly designed bus gates before you are suddenly directed to cross the traffic onto the opposite side of the road only to be dumped back into the traffic just before the end.

Tempted to call it a load of bollards...

Irwell Towpath - WTF?

This idiotic design for the new bridge over the entrance to the night soil dock was exposed for all it's shortcomings over the weekend. Some idiot with no experience of the force of the Irwell in flood thought it was a good idea to put in a loose surface!



Large amounts of it got washed away on Sunday leaving this mess!



The crap in the railings show just how high the water reached.

 

Much of the rest of the path is covered in up to 10cm of silt - so it's pretty much out of action for the foreseeable future.

Salford Council fail again!

Portland Street - still a bus sandwich

Took this video today.

Only a small part of this dangerous cycle route has been modified, the rest is probably the most dangerous part.



This was how it looked back in March.

One has to wonder what this all cost. Perhaps I'll get round to an FoI request...

Armadillos, Broken Bollards and Crass Carparking

Welcome to Salford's shit cycle infrastructure.

Starting at the junction with the A576, this is Great Clowes Street in Salford. This is the start of a new set of cycle infrastructure, and it leaves a lot to be desired...



The cycle lane has only just started when it runs straight into a bus stop.



Next there is a plastic island with two plastic bollards. Note how the island is entirely in the cycle lane, not even on the white line. This makes the cycle lane feel crowded and, quite frankly threatening.



Next there are the armadillos - these useless items are a method of dumping waste plastic from Spain on the UK's roads. Note how these are placed well into the cycle lane rather than on the white line as was the case with the original trial on Middlewood Street and Liverpool Street.




These plastic lumps make cycling along this route very uncomfortable.



You quite quickly feel trapped between the armadillos which, because of their shape, could easily throw you into the road and the rubbish which is strewn in the cycle lane.



At the junction with Upper Camp Street, all the plastic falls away and the junction is totally exposed to oncoming traffic.



Beyond the junction the dirty, un-swept cycle route feels neglected and horrible.



At the junctions there is no protection. All the cars I saw emerging from side lanes blocked the cycle lane. Notice how this cycle lane then crashes into a bus stop.



In any location where there is a bus stop or a junction there is no physical protection whatsoever.

In other words, when it gets difficult and dangerous, you are on your own.



This bus stop show just how sharply a bus must swerve across the cycle lane to get into the bus stop.

This is dangerous!



Further along, this traffic cone, left in the middle of the cycle lane, demonstrates just how much Salford council really care about people cycling.



This area is strewn with broken glass and broken pieces of traffic cones.



And then we find the cycle lane blocked by a car...



Almost parked right up against the next set of bollards this car IS PARKED LEGALLY!

There are no double yellow lines...



On Broughton Bridge you approach the carnage of broken plastic...



Here traffic cones mark the locations where vehicles have smashed up the bollards, here one has been destroyed,



next both have disappeared.



As you move onto Blackfriars road there are more



and more broken bollards.



Followed by proof that the armadillos can't keep motor vehicles out of cycle lanes



provided by a "HIGHWAYS MAINTENANCE" driver who was fitting something to a nearby lamppost.



There are then a few more items of plastic in the cycle lane before



you are thrown into this expanse of tarmac as you approach Trinity Way.



After Trinity way there is a short burst of green paint



before the cycle lane turns into car parking spaces and charging points for electric cars.



Quite why this stretch is given over to parking is something only Salford Council can answer,



and at the end of it there was yet another car blocking the cycle lane.



At the junction with Viaduct Street there are lots of cones and road signs in the cycle lane.



Finally the cycle route ends in this bus stop.



The rest of the route into Manchester City Centre is just road.

Quite frankly this is horrible nasty, dirty and neglected.

Portland Street is now open...

According to Manchester City Council, "MCC Highways are satisfied the requisite design processes have been followed to achieve a design that is suitable for implementation and therefore no changes will be made at this stage."

This video was taken early on a Saturday morning, before this area gets really busy - in it I take the line the lanes suggest - not an approach I would recommend.

Portland Street - is this Manchester's most dangerous cycle lane?

Now the Portland Street roadworks are beginning to subside the damage done to cycle access to this part of the city center is becoming clear. Here are a series of photographs I took this morning whilst walking along Portland street. They are all in sequence and show just how dangerous this new section of cycle lane really is.

Any sensible person would keep well to the right at this point and hold the centre of the traffic lane, but anyone tempted to ride in the cycle lane at this point is putting them in severe danger of ending up under a bus. We told TfGM just how inadequate their proposals for cycling along Portland Street were, but they totally ignored us and changed nothing.

Here you see one bus in the bus stop whilst a second pulls up.



Then a third bus stops completely blocking the cycle lane.



And a fourth bus then covers up the cycle lane completely. Note the warning to cyclists not to pass a bus on the left hand side!



The buses all then pull away



but continue to block the cycle lane



and do so even as they cross the traffic lights.



The sequence then repeats a few moments later



Just imagine trying to cycle through this!



When looked at from the other direction you can see how buses held at the lights on pulling out of the bus stop also block the cycle lane.



And yes you can see this dreadful design in the original publicity video.



The engineer who designed this should be forced to cycle up and down Portland Street on a busy Saturday morning until they work out the error of their ways.

Smashed Sign & Missing Bollards

Two weeks ago I posted pictures of the ludicrous "repair" of the bollards on Middlewood Street, and asked "How long before a passing HGV sends the sign and bollard flying?"

Well, the answer is less than two weeks...

This was the site two weeks ago,



and this is the site today.



I found the smashed road sign around 50 metres further down the road and the bollard was nowhere to be seen.



How long before TfGM and the local councils come to realise that this sort of plastic rubbish is a waste of money?

Broadway Pavement - The Quays to Booths

Going west on Broadway from the dangerous roundabout that is the junction with The Quays there have been some works on the pavement.



It seems that Salford Council think this narrow pavement is a suitable cycle facility.



On the other hand they may just be using capital grants from the DfT to repair the pavement.



The works round here are so poor they can't even remove the parked cars before painting the double yellow lines...



Those cycling this way are firmly sticking to the road



as this gives priority over the side roads



and avoids the manu obstructions.



However, further along as you reach MediaCityUK you can see people taking advantage of this new facility.



The gardening contractors seem to think it makes a great car park



for the van and trailer.



As you get round the back of Booths



another pavement vehicle comes into view.



Salford council have wasted thousands of pounds of cycling money from the DfT on resurfacing a pavement on a back road that few people cycle on rather than investing in proper cycle routes where people want to travel.

It is about time that TfGM and the DfT audited the return on investment from cycle projects in Greater Manchester. This one has just been a waste of money!