Donations flood in to judicial review fundraiser in East BristolBarton Hill resident unable to park adapted van outside house
A fundraiser set up to try to mount a legal challenge against the controversial East Bristol Liveable Neighbourhood is on its way to raising £2,000 in just two days.
The Crowdfunder is looking to raise an initial total of £5,000 to start a judicial review against the council following its decision to make the traffic and road changes in Barton Hill, Redfield and St George permanent earlier this summer.
The fundraising appeal was set up by one of the leading anti-EBLN campaigners, Melissa Topping, who is disabled and lives in Redfield.
She said there are many grounds to challenge the council’s creation of the Liveable Neighbourhood, including issues around whether the council properly considered the impact on disabled people and the elderly, as well as on local businesses.
The EBLN was installed and completed more than a year ago, after a couple of years of controversial consultation. It involves bus gates in Barton Hill and ‘modal filters’ – large planters – which block roads for four-wheel vehicles but allow pedestrians, cyclists, scooterers and motorbikes through.
A couple of roads in Barton Hill also had removable bollards installed that can be lowered by emergency services.
“Safer, Calmer, Cleaner” – posters in windows of homes in Redfield and St George where people support the East Bristol Liveable Neighbourhood trial(Image: PAUL GILLIS / Reach PLC)
The EBLN has divided opinion in Bristol and within the area it covers. It has many supporters, particularly among people in the terraced streets of St George, who said their residential roads were being used as rat-runs by commuters trying to avoid the main A420 road.
But in Redfield and Barton Hill particularly, where the EBLN infrastructure and road lay-outs are more complex, there has been support, but also vociferous opposition from local residents and business owners.
OPINION
Many took direct action to try to stop the installation of bus gates on the junction of Marsh Lane and Avonvale Road, while other signage and features have been vandalised.
Last month, the city council voted to turn the ‘trial period’ into a permanent set-up, but costs have spiralled and the council needs more millions from the metro mayor Helen Godwin and the West of England Combined Authority.
Melissa Topping’s judicial review could challenge the council on the way it consulted over the EBLN – for example, Bristol Live reported that the council said it consulted with a disabled residents’ group, but no such group existed.
Melissa Topping(Image: (Image: Paul Gillis ))
“This already was an active travel corridor, we just needed some speed calming and possibly a one way sign here and there,” said Melissa.
“We did not need all our roads blocked off with a river and a train line boarding the community with very few routes over those.
“FOI responses clearly show, BCC did not consult emergency service teams, disabled groups, the elderly, the businesses, the churches,” she added. “They asked: ‘What do you like about your area & what would you like to see improved in your area?’
“We asked for improved services, better street lighting, speed calming and dropped kerbs. We got plastic planters blocking access to roads and bus gates outside our businesses and GP surgery, meaning the long way round, or a fine.
“For many this has been a scheme for the rich, whilst the most deprived community is left to fend for itself with extended journeys, higher fuel costs, traffic on boundary roads and outside two of the local schools.
Over 5000 people have signed the petition against East Bristol ‘liveable neighbourhood scheme’ (EBLN) (Image: Tom Wren / SWNS)
“It’s left many not wanting to come to the area, meaning we’ve lost support networks, we have higher taxi fares, tradespeople charge more, or won’t come at all.
“Crime has increased, drug dealing and taking is seen daily on our ghost streets. Litter is at an all time high, as is waste uncollected. Our streets are now much more unsafe, for lone women, for our low paid shift workers, disabled, elderly, all now imprisoned in open cells.
“This was dressed up as safer, calmer, cleaner streets, it’s far from any of those. We’ve been left with roads that can’t be accessed by large vehicles, many having to reverse full lengths of streets, with no turning points for anyone – Victorian streets with dead ends,” she added.
The EBLN scheme has been changed and altered a few times since it was first installed – with the most controversial bus gate moved to allow more access into Barton Hill.
Part of the EBLN
When councillors voted to make the scheme permanent in July, they also voted for improvements to a key junction on the edge of the EBLN zone – where Blackswarth Road, Church Road and Chalks Road meet.
The committee back on July 8 voted by five votes to four to approve the business case to be submitted to WECA to make the scheme permanent.
The four Greens on the committee voted in favour of making the scheme permanent, along with Liberal Democrat Councillor Nicholas Coombes. Three Labour councillors and the one Conservative councillor voted against the scheme, which they said was too polarising and was ‘tearing the community apart’. However they welcomed the promised changes to the scheme.
At the meeting, Green Cllr Emma Edwards said: “There is less traffic on residential streets within the area. More people are walking, wheeling and cycling and taking the bus. This is what the data is telling us. And this is a public health intervention as much as a transport one. But this has been tricky and not everybody has been feeling the benefits.
“We’ve done a huge amount of engagement with the community, lots of door knocking, speaking to councillors who have held surgeries. Based on that feedback, we have already made changes. The trial’s purpose, to learn and adapt, that has happened. That engagement cannot stop. Continuing that feedback is really important,” she added.