The human face of our city's People Friendly fiasco

A MUM from Amesbury has written to tell me how Salisbury’s new traffic arrangements are messing up her life.

She drives twice a day to the city on a school run. Her child has what she calls a ‘hidden’ disability among other health problems that rule out bus travel.

(And anyway, her nearest park and ride is currently a Covid testing centre.)

She is not eligible for a permit because her child’s disability allowance “does not have a motability component to it”.

Since the ETRO was introduced, she says, it has on a few occasions taken her over 90 minutes to drive to Salisbury and back because of the traffic on the ring road.

“It’s costing a fortune in fuel and I am already on a very tight budget.”

One day recently she was heading out of town past Bishop Wordsworth’s School as an ambulance was coming in.

“The cars had to mount the pavement so he could get through because the metal bollards didn’t allow enough of a space on my side of the road. At the time, the pavement was packed with school children.”

I just thought I’d like to put a ‘human face’ on the Facebook campaign SOS - Save Our Salisbury  to show how disruptive and potentially dangerous these traffic schemes are.

The fact that our MPJohn Glen has now publicly urged Wiltshire's leaders to think again, at least until after the worst of the pandemic is over, underlines the strength of our case.

Wiltshire's deputy leader, Richard Clewer, who has consistently shown an understanding of city residents' concerns - remember how he acted as mediator in the row over the Market Place refurbishment? - is doing his best to help but he hasn't been able to make much headway with his council colleagues yet. 

In fact, cabinet member for highways Bridget Wayman has taken a decidedly snippy tone in her responses to complaints on Facebook and Twitter.

It's understandable. There's an awful lot of face to be lost in backtracking.

But this is such a sad waste of public money. Our money. At a time when the NHS and its staff could really do with any spare cash the nation's got, just to get through the next few months.

We do need to improve our air quality. We do need to pedestrianise part of the city centre. We do need to make life easier for cyclists.

Just not this way, and not now, when our traders are reeling from the economic impact of the coronavirus crisis.

All it would have taken to avoid this debacle is a bit more time and effort put into a meaningful consultation with the people who live and work here, who know how the city operates. A bit more respect for Joe Public.