Conservative councillors wanting to scrap a controversial £13 million road project have been told that they can’t try to pull the funding at the annual budget council meeting.
Brighton and Hove City Council’s Conservative group wants to halt “Valley Gardens phase three” – the final stage of a project that includes replacing the Aquarium roundabout with a traffic light-controlled T-junction.
The Tories called on the Labour-run council scrap the scheme before the “budget council” meeting on Thursday (22 February).
They want to use £1 million from the capital budget for the Valley Gardens project on other transport projects such as fixing the roads.
But council officials have told the Conservatives that scrapping the final phase of the Valley Gardens scheme would mean returning grant funding to the government and the loss of money already spent.
The £13 million final phase is partly funded with £6 million from the government through the Coast to Capital Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) as well as £1.8 million from the council’s capital budget and a further £5 million from borrowing.
Conservative deputy leader Anne Meadows said: “How much money are Labour going to keep throwing at ‘Valley Gardens three’ before they realise that it will only make matters worse?
“We are facing enough financial issues without continuing to spend and borrow to fund ‘Valley Gardens three’.”
Councillor Meadows added: “If we scrap it now, we can cut our losses and have around £817,000 to invest in our roads. That sounds like a better idea to me – and I’m sure many residents would agree.”
Phase three was originally slated to cost £7.8 million but the bill has risen to £13 million because of significant delays caused in part by the coronavirus pandemic.
Labour paused the project for a review after winning a majority in the local elections last May, giving a glimmer of hope to the scheme’s critics.
But earlier this month, Labour councillor Trevor Muten, who chairs the council’s Transport and Sustainability Committee, said that the tendering process for the project had been started.
The proposed road layouts have been redrawn several times under councils of all political colours since the scheme was first mooted more than 15 years ago by former Labour councillor Gill Mitchell.
Work on the first and second phases of the scheme cost £11 million and finished in September 2020 when buses were routed along the western side of Victoria Gardens.
The final phase includes and outdoor events space and segregated cycle between the seafront and Victoria Gardens through a new pedestrianised area in front of the Royal Pavilion and another south of Old Steine.
You cant spend government funded project money on providing council services
I can hear the distant roar of adacious bickering associated name callings to come, imminently this phase 3 will cause a riptide kind of earthquake throughout the sanctuary on sea cllrs whether they are within red, blue ,green, neutral or whatever coloured parties.
This will undoubtedly cause a regular catastrophic set of chain reactions kind of accidents and major road hold ups.
The soon to be released chain of backlashing consequences are on the cards that is for certain, especially so once the current perfectly usable and has bern for literally decades now poor old aquarium roundabout along with road layout system here is smashed up to smithereens and taken awayfor recycling, and then afterwards what a palava it will become by replacing with this abomination of a soon to be installed traffic lights sequence T-JUNCTION system and associated new road layout it beggers belief why they just didn’t get some grown ups to take control here and only change the bus routing and certain other aspects with the final phase 3 here but kept the fully functioning current roundabout and road layout systems here ,changing it will I fear endanger pedestrians and car drivers lives.
But you can save the £6 million + which is coming from the council’s budget
Perhaps ask Muten how he justifies burdening the local taxpayer with £6million when there’s a cost of living crisis and BHCC has a budget deficit?!
Indeed. There is no logical justification!
If VG3 was stopped £6m of public funding received via a grant would have to be repaid. I am not sure where the funds would then come from to fund the alternative proposals?
Well if they decide on cancelling phase 3 and having to return funding it’ll fall in line with the other “great” financial decision making over last 10 years…..
But there isn’t then £6m to spend on services as this is from the capital budget which can’t be used on day to day spending.
And returning the grant makes it harder to get future grants as the people making the decisions won’t have confidence that you’ll spend it and give it to another council.
But there will be a £6 million liablity on the council’s balance sheet they would not have otherwise had
its a government loan
Anne Meadows does that politician thing of ignoring the explanation on why it should go ahead and saying what she was going to say
She is very good at that!
Meadows wants to throw away £13 million in development in order to spend £1 million on potholes
VG3 literally divides the city. Pushing all the traffic, inclufing buses, through a bottleneck east side only route is dangerous and unwanted. The scheme could be so much better however the Cllr Muten has not consulted with any stakeholders, resident groups, local businesses or residents and all claims of consultation lie solely with blinkered cycling lobby groups only. There will be no parking in Old Steine, only 6 baus for the 2 surgeries; buses will be turning in both directions at the St James St junction; 8 lanes of traffic will be squeezed into 4 lanes mixing with buses on the east side and deliveries for local businesses will be virtually impossible to carry out leading to further difficulties for local tradesmen to be able to.operate. Yes to a scheme but not this scheme.
IMO the current layout is what divides the city. The number of crossing points, confusing layout, width of carriageway to negotiate, waste of road space all conspire to offer an awful looking car dominated mess, hard to negotiate by any mode.
The new layout which will reduce crossing points between St James st and the city centre/lanes, remove the traffic canyon from the immediate boundary of the Pavilion estate and better unite these spaces with the seafront is an absolute win.
It is only really a problem for those who think of the area is just for the benefit of motorists passing through, and develop all sorts of fears for their entitlement, which are largely unfounded.
Mr Muten and his team has ignored all the feedback from the likes of trades who service the city, be that sole traders or commercial companies, and the offices within Old Steine. As the example photo shows, all 32 parking bays to go so what is the point of buying the traders permit so as to attend work of an urgent nature such as the flats above the YMCA, and at Graves Son & Pilcher for just two examples. Its bad enough in the Lanes with all the bays gone. Blinkered viewpoints, with even wider pavements plus this obession of yet more event space, which removes the gardens for everyone and blocks it across with unsightly barriers to sell the venue space to commercial themes to then charge people to go in.
Nobody minds the refurbishment that comes with the valley Gardens work. The main objection here is over the stupidity in VG3 of directing all pedestrians and cyclists straight at the city’s busiest road junction.
No alternative route is provided for essential visitor and commuter traffic. No new bus routes allow buses to avoid this junction, and so services will be slowed considerably.
Many of us enjoy and use separate city centre cycle routes, but there is no reason for new cycle lanes to be directed straight at this junction, and there is good reason why pedestrians crossings are currently set back from the junction.
Replacing the roundabout is a complete act of self harm for the city.
Going straight across here is the most direct route. Attempting to walk from the pavillion to the pier currently is ridiculous – you have to walk almost twice as far!
The key problem with this scheme is that it’s trying to satisfy everyone and as a result satisfies no one! I’m yet to see anyone suggest a viable alternative though. One solution would be to route the cycle lane in line with the road (instead of through the pedestrian area) but this would involve removing trees, which everyone would then moan about. The council literally can’t win with this…
Or as the VG Forum suggested route the cycle lane through the discussed Pool Valley and connect it to the seafront. There are lots of better suggestions than the utter clusterf**k we are being given.
Labour’s biggest mistake since coming to power – and it’s a total howler. It is also totally avoidable. Have a proper redesign of VG3 – address the congestion problem, (as identified by an independent consultant), address the huge amount of issues Buswatch have continually pointed out, listen to the Valley Gardens forum and give us a VG3 that works for everyone and doesn’t stupidly blow £7 million of taxpayers money. Labour say they listen but I am afraid with this scheme it does not ring true.
It’s very difficult to see where pedestrians are supposed to go! From a glance at the image it appears there are far more cyclists than pedestrians-is that based upon research or fantasy?
Also, it appears that cyclists have right of way over pedestrians YES/NO?
Really?
If you think pedestrians are ill served in this proposal, just wait till you see what they have to put up with at the moment!
Maybe you are reading the picture wrong?
The vibrant green stripes are the cycle tracks, the dark grey bit are for cars etc… and *all* the other bits are for pedestrians.
I never had any problems as a pedestrian getting from the Old Steine to the Palace Pier using crossings with traffic lights.
The problems are with cyclists ignoring said lights and not observing give-way markings as they refuse to observe the Highway Code that’s says they should give way to pedestrians.
There should be a REFERENDUM on this .
I was excited to note that according to the BHCC benefit study, the overall travel time for general traffic in the morning is 48s quicker, and in the evening is 116s slower. For buses this is 42s quicker, and in the evening is 68s quicker. They didnt bother doing a study on noise or air pollution….and the oad safety risk increases a bit (but they won’t say hiw much by).
BHCC at it very best.
How do commuters sea front residents ambulances etc get to marina rottingdean saltdean etc if coming down sea road A259 on a daily basis? What absolute nonsense. Tax paying commuters have a right to get to work in time surely! . Ambulances will no longer be able to get To A & E by Paston place sea front these ‘councillors’ obviously have an ambition to kill off this once working and tourist city. This plan is not fit for purpose. Cost of each separate component of this should be accounted for! Someone somewhere is making a mint out of resident misery.