Branson vs Pickles – Virgin boss wants towns for people, minister wants them for cars

have either of these two (pickles or branson) studied architecture, town planning, master planning, or urban design? the things they say would make you believe they have...

You know you're in the right when Pickles holds the opposing view.

Look, just build him a drive-through Greggs and hope he shuts up.

People go to out-of-town superstores because they can park near a big shop, buy all their stuff, load it straight into the car and sod off. With loads of small shops close together (high street) that's never going to be possible. OK it used to be the case that, rather than doing a big shop once a week, people would go and buy fresh stuff every day from shops they could walk to. Well people don't have the time or the patience now. Couples both have to work full time to pay the mortgage, the cost of motoring is still lower than it ever was. That's what's killed the high street.

What Mr Pickles doesn't seem to have taken into consideration is that it won't be just the occasional driver who stays on yellow lines for 15 minutes - the whole road will be taken up. And when one driver moves on after his allotted time (whatever that might be) then there will be another driver only too ready to take up the recently vacated spot. Result - chaos.

That little tinker Jeremy Clarkson, you've got to love him haven't you? Well, err, NO!
He sang the praises of Copenhagen, stating he would live there in a heartbeat. Well I'll readily contribute some cash to any fund that will encourage him to relocate there permanently.
If every cyclist contributed to the fund we might have to pay as much as one pound - very good value I'd say.

Cycling in many cases simply isn't an option, I can think of plenty of reasons of the top of my head such as hilly route, inclement weather, cost of purchasing a bike, lack of convenience when having to transport items home etc.

My wife is looking at purchasing a 'town bike', that will cost at least £200, for us we can afford that it but for many people that is a lot of money, especaiily for transporting bread and milk!

He's being advised by that cigerette lobbyist fella, say this, say that, it'll be popular etc.

As if he needed any help to be c**k.

Pickles going for the low-hanging fruit (or should that be pastry) of the "motorists as persecuted group" vote. How original.

Making it difficult for cars in town centres will not make me ride my bike instead. I cycle to town when it's appropriate, i.e. when I don't have to lug home a load of shopping. If I want to buy bulky stuff then I'm going to take the car whatever. And in the winter, forget the bike. I can't cycle when it's so cold that my head goes numb and I lose all sense of balance. What we need in town centres are more places to pick up and drop off pedestrians. The only way I can stop to drop my wife and daughter in town is to stop on a double yellow line, ensuring that the nazis (parking wardens) are not loitering.

in Cambridge, we get the gumbies posting on the local news sit moaning that city centre parking is too expensive, yet the car parks all fill up at the weekends...

Cars and traffic are what have killed the high street, not a lack of parking. There are numerous examples in the UK alone where closing areas to traffic has increased trade. There are also several studies showing that pedestrians and cyclists spend more at local shops than motorists do.

Eric Pickles' agenda will drive more people to large chains and out of town centres.

@Simon: indeed, potholes and everything. Needs more yarnbombing though

Pickles does have a point. Around here, fairly recent implementation of parking fees I small rural towns has harmed the small shops that we doing Ok. The local council is also losing money by charging and subbing out the parking contact!
Equally Sustrans are living in their own world. Again around here, no car based travel is not an option, the buses being so infrequent and expensive. Shopping locally also means paying or arking!

Quote:

Eric Pickles, Communities Secretary, says it is time to do away with “draconian” parking policies, bollards and speed humps that he claims stop people visiting high street shops.

To be fair to Pickles, he's likely to have been told this by representatives of local business. Its the local those people who are out of touch.

In a recent article I read about my town's redevelopment, the council said that the town needed more parking, as that's what the local businesses said was their highest priority. Thing is, there are already 1400 bays in council car parks according to council website. When you take into account private car parks (Waitrose, M&S, Tesco, not to mention loads of small ones eg I know at least 5 pubs with car parks) this is probably 2000 parking bays. This is in a town with 30,000 residents. If you put 5 people in a car, then a third of the entire population can park in the town centre at the same time.

I actively avoid driving to our nearest town centres (Witney and Chipping Norton) precisely because of the free parking. Because they're free, it's vastly popular - not least with very local residents who could feasibly walk or cycle. That means that finding a space in the car park on a Saturday morning is a hugely stressful experience. (Someone was actually run over by a reversing car in a Chippy car park earlier this year.)

Since I hate the stress of finding a space then gingerly manoeuvring into it, I therefore avoid these two towns and take the train into Oxford for my shopping. Or, of course, cycle if I haven't got too much to carry.

Given where this has come from, I can't help but be reminded of the expression: "Building roads to cure congestion is like loosening your belt to cure obesity."

You'd have thought that Pickles, of all people, would understand that doesn't work.

Quote:

pubic transport

Arf arf

let pickles have his way ... it wont take long for complete
and utter grid-lock to set in then we can sit back and say
"Told you so you idiot"

Get out of your car, Pickles. And step away from the pie.

If my shopping experiences are to go on (no I'm not a good example) then shopping in physical stores has reduced product choices, higher prices put against the physical aspects of touching, viewing and the "get it right now" no delivery wait. If they have it in stock!

So getting rid of parking issues wouldn't mean that I would any more frequently shop in a physical store than now.

It's a pity but comparing LBS and the likes of Wiggle, Chain Reaction, etc. is tricky. You cannot have a large stock base in a physical town centre shop as the price of the shop floor means that it is too expensive to have a large stock. That has nothing much to do with customer parking and street furniture.

My local town centre isn't too bad for parking, I'd guess that 30% of the spaces are free for up to 2 hours and there are cycle racks dotted around plus a decent bus service.

Despite this, we've got a huge proportion of coffee shops and charity shops. The biggest problem for local businesses that I see is the huge cost of running the premises. I looked into opening a shop in the area and the cost of rent and rates was close to £100k per year.

The reason why many motorists go to out-of-town centres is because they're painless to get to, and have loads of free parking. Stress-free.

In-town car parks are ridiculously expensive and often difficult to get to. If the rates are lowered on weekends this might encourage motorists to come into town instead of retail parks. Pedestrianise high streets as well and suddenly you get motorists coming into town and enjoying a local shopping experience along with everyone else.

is that so outlandish?

This is the discussion that needs to be had. Pickles is plain wrong (other than all the ugly signage) - has he actually seriously sat down and thought about what he is proposing?! The sooner people like him can see that more cars is NOT the solution, the better.

We need a properly thought out sustainable transport policy, properly supported by government (local and westminster) to get as many people as possible out of motor vehicles. Cars in towns and cities (and many villages) just choke up everything - I think Pickles needs to step back and take a broader view.

Anyway, it makes a pleasant change from the helmets good/bad thing

Eric Pickles is an interesting physical specimen, isn't he?

His Idea of the "High St" is dead. People shop online more because its easier and cheaper.
If you want Town centres to survive or at least be in a position to compete with Online then business rates & rents for Retail space have to comedown , a lot, to make them more appealing and to encourage Independent Traders who can offer a more bespoke personal shopping experience.
E Pickles is completely out of touch with Modern Life and would probably like the country to be like post war 1950's Britain, in fact if he didn't shave for a week and donned some tramp chic I reckon he would look like green grass off ITV’s Heartbeat.