Letters to the Editor - October 25th

Oct 25 2007 Liverpool Daily Post

Removing our heritage

MAY I heartily concur with your reader (Daily Post, October 22) who remarked upon the removal of the dire St John’s precinct from the artist’s impression of the new tram passing along Lime Street (Page 5, the same day).

It is to be recalled that our council saw fit to demolish the original Victorian market and surrounding area in order to inflict this monstrosity upon us. One would hope that councils would learn, but, alas, their appetite for removing chunks of our heritage in central Liverpool in order to allow some “developer” free range remains undiminished.

However, I would like to also point out another feature of the same “impression”: a total lack of cars and buses along Lime Street.

Where, one wonders, are these going to go?

If the route of the tram has been decided by the same group of individuals who gave us the famous Water Street cycle path, the slow re-laying of The Strand, or the traffic scheme in central Liverpool, then I fear the worst.

Millions have already been squandered in planning this tram route, yet why does it have to pass in front of St George’s Hall? Surely it is intended to either bring workers to their employment or shoppers to their shops, neither of which are in front of St George’s Hall.

A modern tram scheme should not be designed to merely sit on already congested roads, rendering them even more congested.

A tram from the south of the city can approach the centre via the existing direct access running to Central Station along the now defunct railway.

Similarly, the old Exchange station access in the north can provide routes into the city, although that has been somewhat developed.

Central Liverpool is already congested, even more so since the “improvements” of the cycle-loving transport committee. To further exacerbate the situation by laying tramlines through the busiest sections of the city would be lunacy.

Ian Poole, Mossley Hill

Tram funding

WHEN the Liverpool tramway was abandoned in 1957, in today’s terms that was a public asset worth £6bn, thrown away, never mind the argument about buses being “cheaper and more flexible”.

A petition of 250,000 signatures calling for trams to be retained was ignored. More interestingly, as each tram line converted to faster and more frequent buses, the number of passengers carried dropped by 30%.

This figure has also been found in the USA by the Transportation Research Board, and in France. Of course, Liverpool was offered a free tramway by LETS in 1998, to be run on a commercial basis.

If planning approval had been given in 1999, a tram line to the airport would have been opened in 2003.

The fact that LETS had all the funding in place, did not need a grant from the Government, nor a sub from local businesses should surely be newsworthy, even today?

Perhaps George Train, who also offered a free tramway to the city in 1859, was sensible and built it elsewhere, although he did have an office in Lord Street.

Professor Lewis Lesley, Orrell Park

Rail improvements

IN VIEW of the Government’s recent approval of the London Cross Rail Scheme costing billions of pounds, may we ask what is planned here in the North West as regards rail improvements?

Only a relatively small amount of cash would be required to continue the Merseyrail electrification from Kirkby to Wigan (they extended it to Chester and Ellesmere Port) with Park and Ride facilities at Upholland for Skelmersdale, and at Pemberton for the vast Winstanley Estate.

Other extensions of existing electrification could include Liverpool St Helens-Wigan, Manchester-Bolton Wigan, Manchester, Bolton-Preston and Blackpool and Liverpool-Warrington-Manchester.

We are entitled to our fair share of investment in the north west transport system.

WR Whittle, Wigan

Not on the buses

I READ the comments on transport services in yesterday’s Daily Post with interest.

I work in Stanhope Street and today had the misfortune to have to get there, from Irby, by bus as my car needed its MoT.

There was no problem getting to Liverpool and I got off my bus in Castle Street and walked down to the comparatively new bus stop in Water Street where, in the past, I had caught either the 4A or number 1 to Sefton Street.

The timetable told me a 4A was due in a few minutes. It did not come. The No. 1 was due about 10 minutes later. That did not come either but an 11 did but I let that go, only as it went past did I see Brunswick Dock on the side.

I waited for the next 4A or 1. After 40 minutes, a Number 11 came and I got on that.

The driver said the 4A did not go along that route any more. In all, I had waited for an hour.

Several S1 buses went past me during my wait and I now know that they stop at the junction of Sefton Street with the road to the Marina. That was not mentioned at the bus stop.

OK, changes have to be made because of all the work in progress, but at least make sure passengers are informed and the correct information is in bus shelters.

Nothing in the Water Street shelter said numbers and routes had been changed.

Maybe the regulars knew of the changes, but several others were like me and did not. The changes in the summer were well publicised and information was at the old bus stops but not this time.

Today’s experience has not encouraged me to use public transport for my journey.

Mrs MJ Higginson, Irby

Report welcomed

THE Forum For The Future report, which ranks Liverpool at the bottom of the country’s green league (Daily Post, October 22), is a damning verdict of nearly 10 years of the council’s current Liberal Democrat administration.

The report is to be welcomed, as for the first time it benchmarks the city against other comparable cities in the UK and recognises the increasing importance of quality of life and general wellbeing in public policy.

The report may not specifically take account of the impact of multiple deprivation, but the fact that Liverpool is massively under-performing when compared with cities like Leeds and Manchester, which are similar in population and socio-economic profile to Liverpool, is surely indicative of Liverpool’s successive failure to improve its sustainable profile.

I remember when the Liberal Democrats took control of Liverpool in 1998 and promised that parks would be placed in trust to protect green open space against development, and that Liverpool would become the greenest city in Europe, both of which were subsequently abandoned.

Liverpool was late off the blocks in delivering kerb-side recycling, a service the council did not offer to residents until 2003 and still does not offer in all parts of the city.

The “do-nothing” response of executive member Berni Turner betrays a belief that the sustain- ability agenda under her watch is more spin than substance.

Cllr Nick Small, Labour Spokesperson on Regeneration, Liverpool City Council

No ambition

WHAT qualifications does Alex Curran have as a perfumer (“Alex smells success in her new venture”, Daily Post, October 24)?

Can someone please explain to me why all of a sudden it seems that just about anyone can get their own perfume/fashion line/ book deal for doing very little other than marry someone else who has a talent which places them in the public eye.

Don’t get me wrong. I do not know Alex Curran and for all I know she is a lovely, intelligent girl.

But what is her job? If it is to simply be the wife of one of our best-loved football players, then fine, she should leave it at that and enjoy herself.

Really, is it any wonder that so many young girls these days have no ambition other than to marry a footballer or a pop star when they see girls getting this sort of opportunity?

It is like we have gone back in time to when little girls used to dream of marrying princes when they grew up.

J Kershaw, Heswall

Neglected town

IF EVER we needed evidence that what the council says and what the council does are two different things, we now have it (Daily Post, October 18).

The council leaders boast about a new £40m store in Birkenhead and, at the same time, dismiss concerns from Wallasey residents about our town being neglected.

The Health is Wealth Commission finds that people in Wallasey believe money is more likely to be spent improving Birkenhead.

The council, with its never- ending cuts to services, never quite seems to get round to cuts in Birkenhead, does it?

James Keeley, Liscard & Egremont Conservatives

Building saved

GREAT news about the Littlewoods building’s future being secured once and for all (Daily Post, October 24).

We are always hearing about the building of new iconic developments for Liverpool, when in this place we always had one.

It has been so sad all these years to have to drive past it every day and see it in the state it is in. I look forward to it being brought back to life and, given their track record, have the utmost faith in Urban Splash to do the place justice.

L Mathews, Huyton

‘Eyesore’ park

CHAVASSE “Park” was nothing more than a grassed over bomb site that has laid waste for over six decades.

It was an eyesore that developers had no interest in.

I would like to know why the dinosaurs are now kicking up such a song and dance over the magnificent development that is emerging.

EH, Aintree