Cloudberry

I am sure there are plenty of readers who think that is exactly what Hereford needs, but it doesn’t actually add up. If £millions are pledged to build these roads, where does the money come from? None of the expert studies are clear about benefits, but they would have to be huge benefits to match the costs. Are these roads a priority if many other services are cut more and more? There are still enormous deficits and debts all across the board. If a Western Relief Road was built to re-route the A49 over the River Wye and through Breinton, it would be single-carriageway, opening on to housing estates needed to help fund it. This is all presuming that there are loads of people wanting to come and buy new houses in west Hereford. But why would they? They would be on the wrong side of town for jobs in the Enterprise Zone (if lots of jobs do materialise). These extra people will also be travelling in and out of town to go shopping, visit the dentist, take kids to schools, etc. and add to congestion. Would all HGVs use the new road, or would many opt to save fuel and use the shorter route though Hereford? Hereford is a lovely place to live, with beautiful countryside all around. But it is off all main routes. My southern friends can’t believe it takes an hour to drive to Hereford from Gloucester. I think this is actually fine because the unspoilt countryside and heritage are Hereford’s best assets. These assets are what we ought to be using to put Hereford on the map. Remember how we missed out on making the Rotherwas Ribbon an important heritage site?

Thank you, Grid Knocker! Many HGVs can’t use the A465 Abergavenny road to reach Hereford from South Wales because they can’t get past the low railway bridge at Pontrilas (height 4.4m). So a Southern Link Road linking the A465 to the A49 and on to Rotherwas certainly won’t help them. There is also the low railway bridge on the A465 in Belmont (height 4.9m), so big HGVs are not coming from the south to ASDA roundabout and turning back on the A49 to get to Rotherwas on the “Rotherwas Relief Road†either. This means that ALL large HGVs coming or going to/from Hereford and the Enterprise Zone from the south will continue to use the A49 from Ross, where there is the M50 etc. So isn't it crazy to suggest that a Southern Link Road can make a difference to access to the Enterprise Zone or any difference to traffic congestion? P.S. I got the bridge heights off Google Earth Streetview!

ANOTHER MISLEADING STATEMENT According to Council Cabinet Papers for Thurs 13 November, “Economic growth at the Hereford Enterprise Zone would be impacted and congestion could not be reduced†if the proposal for the Southern Link Road is not agreed. But questions in the South Wye Transport Package Report on Public Consultation have still not been answered, - see for example these Herefordshire Council quotes in that document: "4.14.8 People were also concerned that not enough evidence had been provided to justify the potential cost of the new road, and debated whether it would solve the current congestion problems. People would have liked to have seen detailed traffic figures to show the predicted use of the new road. Some people would have preferred to see the money being spent on public transport and traffic management. Others considered that they could not be objective without a detailed breakdown of the costs associated with each route." "4.14.9 It was acknowledged that the assertion in the exhibition that the new road will unlock barriers to development of the Hereford Enterprise Zone (HEZ) and further housing development is misleading, as the location would never have been chosen and approved if significant barriers to development existed. Some also highlighted that the Rotherwas Relief Road was built for this purpose and is under-used. Some were also uncomfortable with the outcome that the new road would help unlock further housing development, as they felt more housing would make traffic worse. See: http://councillors.herefordshire.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=251&MId=5062&Ver=4 A Southern Link Road would actually benefit very few, so how can it be a good idea to spend £27.6 million on it?

There is a great old photo of some lads collecting firewood with the Working Boys Home horse and cart on Old Hereford Pics on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/42752762059/photos/pb.42752762059.-2207520000.1412784481./325966232059/?type=1&theater

If Herefordshire Council want maximum value for money they need to ensure that employees feel a personal responsibility to do a job well. If employees take a pride in their work, they will be more likely to take initiative to overcome problems (problems like wasting time doing nothing and waiting for instructions when their masters can't get organised). Taking personal responsibility also means that there have to be realistic sanctions applied for poor standards of delivery, at all levels in the hierarchy. Value for money is never going to happen if Herefordshire Council rely on remote contractors who know nothing about Herefordshire, do not care about Herefordshire, and are only concerned with getting away with the minimum effort for a set price. There will continue to be disorganised planning and implementation, poor communication and huge wastage of resources.

For a brand new university to be successful in competition with existing universities it would need to attract top quality lecturers, and top quality researchers (teaching, research, and exploitation of research results are different skills). What would attract such people to Hereford? Could their expertise be paid for?

I think you have hit the nail on the head here gdj. Many Councillors do work very hard on the practical things that affect their areas. And it's not surprising if they don't also have time to read and digest the implications of all the papers that come their way. And even if they read them, and see questions that ought to be asked, imagine how much time is needed to do more research and be sure that a challenge is appropriate. Once upon a time there were enough council staff to do research and make sure the Councillors were briefed with facts, enough to make properly informed decisions in a more transparent way. But now..... So now it's up to people on Hereford Voice etc. to help dig up the real facts and expose the innaccuracies, the blatantly misleading statements, and the conflicts of interest.

Thank you for posting this thread, Denise, I thoroughly agree, - what a waste of time and our council tax money. I was also dismayed to see that a glossy colour bus timetable booklet that must also have been very expensive to produce is now out-of-date after only a few months. I presume it had to be replaced because of continuing cuts to bus services. The current bus timetable booklet is on green paper and is very thin in comparison.

I went to have a look this morning, and it was a good experience (but so it should be considering what it cost). Now it is there it needs to be a success. But having said that, I am still concerned about more shops being lost from High Town. "Outfit" in OLM includes Dorothy Perkins and Topshop, so those may not continue in High Town. As far as I know a new H&M will open in OLM very soon, so the existing one up by Lakeland may well close too. There may be other examples we don't know about yet... It was good to see Widemarsh Street into High Town full of people. I wonder if the empty shops there will get new tenants now, as there could be lots of passing trade from people moving between OLM and High Town. M&S seem to be upping their game a bit, with more stock in, and less empty space. I overheard a staff conversation about how to improve displays! So we have more shopping choice, which is very welcome. But you do need plenty of energy and time to get around all the shops if your favourites are now a long way apart, - and the older people of Hereford may find that a bit more difficult.

Biomech, of course it looks better than a half-derelict site waiting to be developed! It jolly well should do considering what's been spent on it! The point is, whether you think it pretty or not, reasonable parking fees will probably be a key factor in making sure the OLM is successful.

It does seem badly-thought-through, or maybe just plain greedy, to open with expensive parking which will restrict both the time and the money people will spend in the OLM. We may not like what it looks like, or the process that has delivered it, but we will all lose out yet again if there are too few visitors and it fails. I don't believe there can ever be any Park and Ride in Hereford to help the parking problem either, because that is very expensive to run. Even if the parking is cheaper and it reduces congestion, people will only use it if they don't have to wait too long for a bus. That means funding buses departing every 10-15 minutes all day. In Swindon and Telford I have seen abandoned Park and Ride car parks with weeds and bushes growing through the tarmac. If big towns with big populations cannot make it work, whatever the promises in the Core Strategy plan I don't think there is any chance that impoverished Hereford can do it.

The Here for Hereford website is awesome! Really worth having a look at other stuff there. They have drilled down into loads of Council docs to show us the weaselly Council words that don’t actually stack up. Well done for showing us what’s not true, and that the Highways Agency don't support building a western relief road. Take the blinkers off folks. Although a western by-pass sounds like it will sort Hereford out, there’s no money for it unless property developers are allowed to profit from it. Thousands of new homes may result in some sort of by-pass with loads of roundabouts connecting the housing estates, but that wouldn't be a new fast A49 that people expect. And all those new people living in the new homes would surely drive in and out of Hereford making the centre worse than ever. Isn’t that a very bad deal for all Herefordian residents, whatever side of Hereford they live?

I heard that the current fire station building cannot be kept because the concrete structure is deteriorating with some sort of "concrete cancer". If that is true it might explain the apparent urgency in finding a location for new premises?

What worries me most is the potential threat to lives. Whoever heard of a city reducing road capacity with new obstacles, on a primary east-west route that is also a major access route for all emergency services: the hospital, police station and fire station? Though I suppose slower traffic may reduce the number of road accidents. But we can at least be grateful that we will still have two lanes of some shape in each direction, not the single lanes in the plan shown in the Hereford Times in October. Single lanes in Newmarket Street were originally planned on the proviso of an alternative major route, a link road between Edgar Street and the station, - but the likelihood of that being built now seems probably impossible. The idea of a leafy boulevard fronting the OLM in Newmarket Street, with only a few vehicles as in that famous illustration, is just fine. But it’s not going to be like that, is it?

Lots of positive ideas for the New Year! Now how can we try and make some of them work, as part of a holistic, overall plan for central Hereford? If there are ways to get round the issues of land ownership, high business rates, and all the other funding problems, let’s find them! Like many on this thread I am very uneasy about the potential prosperity of OLM, as the spending boom has long gone. Most people have to check their spending very carefully, and that situation is not improving and could easily get worse if mortgage rates rise. So it will continue to be very hard for all retailers to maintain, (let alone increase), their profits. Anyway, we have a lot of empty premises, and we know we could put them to very good use to promote the assets of Hereford to attract more tourists and students. A traditional “university†probably wouldn’t work as Hereford would not attract top academic lecturers and would not be competitive for funding. But we do have a lot of local expertise and skills to share, including from retired people and other volunteers - everything from the geological and environmental research of the Woolhope Club to cider-making and knitting scarves for endangered trees! Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have galleries and workshops with a cafe in the Left Bank, so that visitors to Hereford could actually enjoy the river frontage? I really like the idea of moving the Library to the Maylords too, and making the present library premises solely a museum and gallery. The more there is for visitors to look at in Hereford, the more visitors we will get. And the more visitors, the more they will spend here in shops and cafes and help to keep our retailers in business.

I can see that many people might feel deprived of a by-pass here while other towns do have them. And it's a logical solution, until you look at all the issues together, - including geography, natural history, land ownership, politics, and of course lack of funding opportunities. Any plan for a by-pass, east or west, has the awkward problem of crossing the River Wye. In the west it would need to be expensively high level as the River Wye has steep sides over there, probably with a cutting through a hill on the way, - while on the east, although the land is lower there is the problem of getting round the Lugg meadows. Throw in the fact that the whole River Wye is an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and that there are unique habitats for plants and animals that have, or deserve, protection all around Hereford. Then add the fact that large-scale building on Grade 1 and 2 agricultural land should not be allowed. It is almost all high grade around Hereford, especially on the west, unlike most parts of the whole country, so with more people to feed and uncertain climate this land could be critical for the future. Finally throw in the computer models of traffic flow that suggest that huge investment on a by-pass would not have the expected benefits. The models show that much of the traffic counted at any point in Hereford is travelling in or out rather than through the middle. The model predictions also suggest that a by-pass would result in greater fuel use on a longer route than through the middle, but not significant saving of time. A dual-carriageway option is not affordable now, and the best that could be done would be a single carriageway road built piece by piece through new housing estates. This plan for the “western relief road†is still in the Council’s Core Strategy Plan, but many people oppose it, for reasons outlined above. Instead there is a lot that can be done with much less investment to ease traffic flow through the middle of Hereford for all users, - that is for drivers, cyclists and pedestrians.

I totally agree with what Mark is saying. It has become clear that it is not possible to fund any sort of by-pass without it being provided as part of extensive housing developments. As he says, the housing would have to come first, with all those extra cars driving in and out of Hereford. The so-called "by-pass" would be planned as a single carriage-way road through the new housing estates (no chance of a dual carriageway type of by-pass, not like the Rotherwas road) and might never even get joined up around Hereford. The developers would be very happy, and the owners of new homes might be happy, but many of the rest of us would be in absolute despair.

A "Core Strategy Challenge Group" has been initiated, pointing out the serious flaws in the consultation process. You can find more about this group on Facebook and Twitter. Please sign this new 38degrees petition "We have now set up a petition on 38 Degrees calling on Tony Johnson, Leader of Herefordshire Council, to immediately halt the ill-fated Core Strategy Process and consult with us properly to sort out the mess his Planning department have got us all into. This petition is really taking off but we need more signatures and we need them quickly. Reporting on the issue will be coming out tomorrow and we need the petition to back this up and keep the pressure building. Please sign the petition and ask your friends to as well. Really just takes a couple of minutes and it's really important for the future of Bromyard and of Herefordshire." http://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/challenge-herefordshire-core-strategy

I wonder if they have asked the SAS? I am not sure the regiment would like to draw more attention to their location. On the other hand I have seen the remaining old buildings on the Rotherwas site, and they are well worth using as a tourist destination. Think Bletchley Park. Herefordshire can only benefit from any new displays of heritage that attract the tourist economy. The description could be stretched to include this as an enterprise I think, but only if fully funded by a National Lottery Heritage grant or similar.

The time is right for a digital newsletter, and fortnightly would be wonderful if there are enough people to help you. There are many different campaigns and mutual interest groups in Hereford, and at the moment, what with cuts, trees, etc., there is a lot of common ground. However, many of these groups are working almost in isolation. I would like to bring them together, because a concerted effort will have so much more impact, - perhaps on the current Council, but at least on public opinion. A newsletter that could report on the sorts of facts shared on Hereford Voice, but also be available to download and circulate by email would be very welcome. There are many people out there who are very wary of fora (forums), Twitter, Facebook, etc. who are currently missing out on information. In the long term the public will vote for a new Council administration, but they will need to be provided with hard evidence to make their choice, - from now on. Knowledge is power. So, - that knowledge has to be made easier to access.