Let the blog see the rabbit...

This afternoon, the Yellow Advertiser (one of Southend's two free newspapers) came through the door and I had a quick glance through it to see if there was anything relevant to the campaign against the widening of Priory Crescent. As it happens, there was.

Another article caught my eye, however:

Plan on track to ease road jams

A NEW park-and-ride scheme to reduce weekend traffic congestion could be launched at Southend.

The plan proposes people leave their vehicles at the railway station car park and use the train to get into town. The scheme has been suggested by Southend Council leader Murray Foster. He said the new scheme could reduce the amount of congestion around the town and lead to more people using the train service more. Talks with rail managers are expected in the weeks to come. 

Mr Foster said: "We have two mainline stations in the town and we should take advantage of that. This is just in an embryonic state at the moment but I',m hoping it will encourage some discussion on the matter."

Graham Bashford, spokesman for C2C, said the company would be more than happy to speak to Southend Council regarding the scheme. He said: "In principal anything that reduces congestion and gets people on the train is something we would welcome."

A One Railway spokesman said: "We have schemes to encourage people to link buses with trains and we will always look favourably on any proposals of this sort. It is worth noting that this is currently only a proposal has not been presented as a formal scheme. No discussions have yet taken place."

The article is accompanied by a photo of Murray Foster looking shifty outside Southend Central station with a caption reading "PLAN: Murray Foster at Southend Central, the proposed park-and-ride site."

Southend Central, as the name suggests, is in the centre of Southend - it's about half way along the High Street. If people have driven to that station, they don't need to catch a train to get into town! It has a car park run by NCP with a capacity of 140. If you look at a map of the borough, you can see that there are stations every couple of kilometres, meaning that people can easily walk to their nearest station.

The plan make no sense at all, so I emailed Murray Foster this evening:

Dear Mr Foster,

I read first with interest, and then incredulity, the article in this week's Yellow Advertiser on the Park-and-Ride scheme you are proposing.

Surely, the reporter has got it completely wrong. How could it possibly reduce congestion to bring cars right into the centre of the town (and how much closer to the centre can you get than "Southend Central"?) only for the drivers to find that there's nowhere to park once the first 140 cars have filled the car park?

Anyone south of the A13 within the borough is in easy walking distance of their nearest Fenchurch Street line station and those further from a station could cycle or get the bus.

Surely the idea behind a Park-and-Ride scheme is to make it easier for outsiders to come into the town and spend their money in our shops, not get rid of our own residents to the likes of Basildon and Lakeside?

If you are going to introduce a Park-and-Ride scheme, which is a very good idea, the obvious thing to do is approach the Royal Bank of Scotland's offices next to Tesco on the A127 and ask them to allow the public to use their 400+ capacity car park at weekends and then run a regular bus service between there and the Town Centre.

Of course, there wouldn't be so much of a congestion problem to be addressed if the Council had turned down the planning applications for new houses that have been built on the flood plain in Shoebury, something to which I note your friend in Parliament, Mr Duddridge, is strongly opposed.

Yours sincerely,

--
Denis Walker
South East Essex Friends of the Earth
http://www.seefoe.org.uk