Barmy bus lane is a fine mess

1:49pm Monday 2nd April 2007

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I COULD well end up the most unpopular man in Bucks if my latest campaign is successful.

My attempt to sort out High Wycombe's barmy bus lane may end with loads of drivers being lumbered with penalty fines.

And it could even lead to enforcement cameras being planted all the way along the London Road.

But, and I hate to admit it, this would be far safer than the present shambolic arrangement.

The bus lane is one weaving, unsightly, confusing mess that is a carbuncle on the backside of High Wycombe.

However, it is also useless and meaningless, as our sister paper, the Bucks Free Press, proved last week.

The BFP story was my idea actually after my newsdesk informed me the lane was ten years old this month.

On a whim, I sent reporter Ann-Marie Canavan to the London Road last Wednesday evening to count traffic movements.

It was just after 5pm and the bus lane, which bans cars during morning and evening rush hour, should have been operating to maximum effect.

Instead, Ann-Marie counted 37 cars and just one bus in the lane in a 20-minute period. The logical conclusion of this snap survey is that hundreds of cars drive illegally in the lane every day.

On our website, one reader lambasted us for pointing out the bleeding obvious. Everyone in High Wycombe already knows that cars flout the rules of the London Road, so what was the big deal?

True. But the big deal is that the authorities have allowed this pointless monstrosity to continue for ten whole years without either admitting it's a failure or trying to actually make it function properly.

My preference is for it to be scrapped. The lane, which constantly stops and starts, is just not a sensible idea on such a narrow road.

It's dangerous and ugly, and it turns all newcomers right off the town.

But, if the county council won't ditch it, then the only other option is to make it work.

And to do that, councillors have to enlist the regular support of the police to catch offenders. This notion rather sticks in the craw for me because I'm the man who campaigned against the relentless speed camera enforcement on Marlow Hill at the point just before the limit changed from 30mph to 40mph.

But, to my knowledge, there isn't a clear and present danger on Marlow Hill. It's a different matter altogether on the London Road, where cars driven illegally in the left-hand lane during rush hour block off law-abiding motorists who stay in the middle of the road.

I cannot count the times I've found myself stuck in the middle as a result of this.

The trouble is that drivers flout the bus lane rules because they genuinely don't understand them.

So, if enforcement cameras are introduced, there's going to be a lot of bleating from penalised motorists.

But it's not my fault. I didn't create this lane. It was councillors who sanctioned it in the first place and councillors who insist it's still a fab idea.

If they want to keep it, they have to make it work. And to do that, they need to nick all those who break its rules.

I predict they will put cameras there and that all hell will break loose when the penalty tickets arrive on your doormats.

But when it happens, don't blame me. If you want scapegoats, look no further than the politicians who have landed us with another above-inflation council tax rise.

To borrow the immortal words of Oliver Hardy - this is another fine mess they have gotten us into.