You asked why they didn’t choose Ouse Bridge, and I’ve seen other people ask the same question. Lendal Bridge is part of the approach to the Minster, and alongside the ‘cultural quarter’, and that’s more important to tourism and our ‘visitor offer’ and our ‘cultural offer’, etc. I guess it looks better to visitors without ordinary residents cluttering it up with their cars and vans. This is really all about how things look to visitors, not really about air quality.

I’d like to be able to comment intelligently on your specific suggestions, but I’m not a driver so don’t feel qualified to.

Having followed the ‘trial’ closely and with great interest all I can say is that from all angles it looks increasingly ludicrous. An opinion which appears to be shared by friends I’ve spoken to, also non-drivers. It wasn’t wanted by the majority and it’s an embarrassing shambles, in my view.

“when I get homesick I like to read your blog, in fact re-reading some of my favourite blog posts is one of my (sad) hobbies!”
That’s not sad at all, it’s very nice to hear, and much appreciated. I re-read these pages a lot too (checking for typos, fact-checking, adding links), so it’s nice to read that someone else does. I think there are at least three of us.

The traffic over Lendal Bridge, and the lead up to it is often very bad, but I still just do not understand why the Council chose to impose trial restrictions on Lendal Bridge before taking other measures first.

What will it achieve? Pedestrians will not really benefit as the pavement will not be wider and there will still be plenty of traffic. I expect the restrictions will reduce overall traffic in York but with little benefit to the area around the restriction zone and with increased traffic in a few other areas.

Did the Council considered pedestrianising Ouse Bridge as a first step? This would have had much more benefits I’m sure.

Without the fire station on Clifford Street, and if combined with re-opening the Piccadilly entrance to Castle Car Park we could have pedestrianised the whole street and expanded the garden from the river to Clifford’s Tower and to the War Memorial which is currently trapped on a roundabout.

Coppergate, which is too narrow for traffic and has seen a number of incidents between buses and pedestrians would also be able to be closed, making a safer more attractive street.

We could also have pedestrianised most of Micklegate too, leaving Rougier/Geoerge Hudson Streets and Skeldergate open for through traffic. This massive expansion of the pedestrian zone would help knit the city centre closer together and revitalise those streets now pedestrianised.

So instead of more green space and a large expansion of the pedestrian zone we have an unpopular and slightly vague traffic restriction on Lendal Bridge.

I would support such a restriction further down the line, after the closure of Ouse Bridge, after the completion of new Park and Ride facilities and after getting Haxby and Strensall Stations reopened.

What do you think? (And this post got a lot longer than I expected!)