An incident in early November in which the roof of a double decker bus was sheared off as it passed under the Hatchet Road railway bridge near Parkway Station has brought renewed calls for a pedestrian subway to be created alongside the bridge.

The bus involved in the collision is understood to have been hired by GWR to transport passengers between Parkway and Temple Meads during a planned three-week railway closure.

There were no passengers on board the bus at the time, and the driver was reported to be “unhurt but shocked”. Fortunately, there were also no pedestrians passing along the narrow footways under the bridge; if there had been, the outcome might have been much more serious (see Cllr Brian Allinson’s column on page 20 of our December magazine).

In 2013, South Gloucestershire Council (SGC) agreed to commission Network Rail to investigate options for improving pedestrian safety at the bridge, since which time there have been no further announcements.

In response to an enquiry from the Journal, an SGC spokesperson said:

“We recognise the need to improve the environment for pedestrians and cyclists at Bristol Parkway’s western access and therefore a subway for pedestrians and cyclists through the embankment to the east of the railway bridge is a strongly held aspiration.”

“The work agreed by a council committee in September 2013 has been undertaken by Network Rail. This has involved the completion of feasibility and outline designs for a subway, and we also subsequently provided additional funding for ground investigations to be carried out on and near the railway embankment to help provide more certainty for future stages of work.”

“The work undertaken has shown us that the construction of the subway would be a very complex scheme due to the close proximity of the railway above. We are considering a number of potential funding mechanisms for the subway delivery and as this is ongoing we are not yet able to comment on possible delivery timescales.”

Related link:

• Report to the PTSE Major Schemes Sub-Committee (2013) [PDF]

This article originally appeared in the December 2018 issue of the Stoke Gifford Journal news magazine (on page 3). The magazine is delivered FREE, EVERY MONTH, to over 5,000 homes in Stoke Gifford, Little Stoke and Harry Stoke. Phone 01454 300 400 to enquire about advertising or leaflet insertion.

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The railway bridge on Gipsy Patch Lane, a notorious bottleneck for traffic and the scene of frequent bridge strikes by high vehicles, looks set to be replaced with a significantly wider concrete structure following a decision made by South Gloucestershire Council’s PTSE Major Schemes Sub-Committee in early October.

From November 2014 to February 2015, the council ran a preliminary consultation on plans for a so-called Cribbs/Patchway MetroBus Extension (CPME), which would extend the North Fringe to Hengrove Package (NFHP) MetroBus route (now under construction in Bradley Stoke and Stoke Gifford) by linking two termini of the NFHP at The Mall Bus Station and Bristol Parkway Railway Station and via the Cribbs/Patchway New Neighbourhood (CPNN), Filton Enterprise Area, Gipsy Patch Lane and Hatchet Road.

A key improvement that the CPME project would deliver is the replacement of the railway over-bridge at Gipsy Patch Lane. The existing Victorian brick-arch structure is narrow and low, resulting in an unattractive environment for pedestrians and cyclists, as well as generating delays for buses and other traffic. A replacement bridge would improve conditions for pedestrians and cyclists in particular, as well as for MetroBus services and other road users.

In September 2013, the same SGC committee approved the procurement of Network Rail to undertake ‘Governance for Railway Investment Projects’ (GRIP) Stage 1 to 3 studies into improvements at the Gipsy Patch Lane railway over-bridge (and also that at Brierley Furlong, which is part of a separate project). GRIP stages 1 and 2 looked at whether it would be feasible to build the bridge. The overall conclusion of GRIP 1 and 2 was that it is technically feasible to replace the existing bridge with a new wider bridge.

More: Wider bridge will add £5m to cost of CPME »

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South Gloucestershire Council has commissioned Network Rail to investigate ways of improving  the passage of vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians under two railway bridges on major routes through Stoke Gifford.

In 2010, the Parkway and Gipsy Patch Lane bridges were the subject of a  feasibility study by Mouchel, which investigated various options for  improving the safe movement of pedestrians and cyclists.

The recommended option at both locations was a concrete box subway, which whilst not necessarily having the lowest cost, would provide for the safe passage of pedestrians and cyclists under the railway embankments, having minimal disruption to road, rail and pedestrian users currently using the existing structures.

A report presented to a recent meeting of the council’s Planning, Transportation & Strategic Environment Major Schemes Sub-Committee, describes how the “adverse impact of the constraints on users passing underneath the railway at the two bridges has increased over recent decades as demand has increased due to the development of surrounding areas”.

The report adds that  there are regular instances of vehicle-strike at the Gipsy Patch Lane bridge, necessitating emergency inspections and causing disruption to both rail and road users.

Upgrading of the two bridges is included within the North Fringe Package of transport improvements that forms part of the council’s recently-adopted Core Strategy, a long-term planning blueprint for the district covering the period up to 2027. The council’s capital programme includes provision of £200k in 2013/4/5 for the project, beyond which further funding sources will need to be found.

Councillors agreed to commission Network Rail to undertake the first three phases of the rail industry’s standard eight phase project delivery process, which will:

1. Define the outcomes required;
2. Define the scope of investment, identify constraints, determine strategic fit and value for money/affordability; and
3. Develop options and select the most appropriate option.

Photo: Gipsy Patch Lane railway bridge.

More info: Report to the PTSE Major Schemes Sub-Committee [PDF]

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