Leeds trolley buses set to get the go ahead!

Riponian · Post by **Riponian** » Fri 29 Oct, 2010 2:55 pm

I do think that at the moment no news is good news, ie that we're not hearing anything about this potential money pit going ahead. The danger is that they start to spend money like they did for the tram and then it all gets cancelled.

raveydavey · Post by **raveydavey** » Fri 29 Oct, 2010 3:32 pm

Surely the real question is "Are Metro fit for purpose?", to use that horrible phrase?My reckoning is no, they're not.

Reginal Perrin · Post by **Reginal Perrin** » Thu 04 Nov, 2010 4:31 pm

Fabian Hamilton asked the PM in PM's question time if he could advise if it will be agreed. He was told that he would be the first one to know.

Leodian · Post by **Leodian** » Thu 04 Nov, 2010 7:21 pm

Reginal Perrin wrote: Fabian Hamilton asked the PM in PM's question time if he could advise if it will be agreed. He was told that he would be the first one to know. No doubt Metro will be the last to know!

raveydavey · Post by **raveydavey** » Thu 04 Nov, 2010 7:36 pm

Reginal Perrin wrote: Fabian Hamilton asked the PM in PM's question time if he could advise if it will be agreed. He was told that he would be the first one to know. Or was it "the first one to, no"?

Post by **chameleon** » Mon 27 Dec, 2010 3:46 pm

Todaay from the YEP. Why am I thinking, 'congestion charging here we come.....'Bid to save Leeds trolleybus scheme:Transport bosses have set out the blueprint they hope will save the Leeds trolleybus scheme from the scrapheap.Government ministers knocked back a bid for funding for the £250m system in October, telling Metro and Leeds City Council to find ways of making it more affordable.* Click here to watch latest YEP news and sport video reports.Now the first details of how they intend to go about that task have emerged in a report compiled for the executive board of Metro, West Yorkshire's publicly-funded passenger transport authority.The report reveals it is likely the scheme will only get the go-ahead if the local contribution to its costs is DOUBLED.Under the funding plan rejected by Transport Secretary Philip Hammond two months ago, city groups such as Metro and the council would have put £50m into the scheme - about 20 per cent of its estimated price tag, with the remainder coming from the Government.According to the Metro report, however, ministers have now indicated that local contributions "in the order of 40 per cent" will be required for projects like trolleybus.The report lists a number of ways in which those contributions could be raised to the magic 40 per cent mark. They include:* Making use of recently-announced Tax Increment Financing powers that allow local authorities to borrow money for capital projects against predicted growth in their business rates;* Seeking third party funding for the cost of trolleybus vehicle purchase and depot construction;* Reducing the scheme's price tag through "re-scoping and value engineering", which effectively means finding savings whenever and wherever possible.Plans for Leeds's trolleybus network were drawn up after Labour axed funding for the city's £500m Supertram light rail scheme in 2005.A final decision from the Government on the fate of the revised project is due next year - and could even be made before Parliament's summer recess, says the Metro report.The electrically-powered system would link the city centre with Holt Park in the north and Stourton in the south.

Brunel · Post by **Brunel** » Mon 27 Dec, 2010 4:23 pm

Trolley Bus....complete madness.

raveydavey · Post by **raveydavey** » Mon 27 Dec, 2010 5:38 pm

I wish I had money to burn on pie in the sky grandoise plans like these like Metro clearly do.How much have all these abortive mass transit plans cost over the years? Enough to let us all travel on the bus for free for a good year or two I'd imagine.Thank the lord that no-one at Metro has ever seen the episode of The Simpsons where the citizens of Springfield buy a monorail system just to stop Shelbyville getting building it, or we know what would surely follow next.

Post by **tyke bhoy** » Mon 27 Dec, 2010 6:26 pm

Cart before a horse? We have already been promised no congestion charging before an appropriate mass transit system is in place (not that I think Trolley bus is appropriate). Can Metro and LCC renege on that promiseMore local funding? Well while a large proportion of Metro's money comes from Leeds council tax payers it is also funded by Calderdale, Wakefield Bradford and Kirklees so we could have the same situation as in Sheffield where the "rates"payers of Rotherham, Doncaster and Barnsley contributed to the tram with very little benefit.Local Business? Well there is the possibility of the operator putting up the investment after all it is billed as a golden goose. Speakingof animals a pig has just flown past. Worst certainly wouldn't risk not been able to pay shareholders hansom dividends and Arriva aren't much better. The other players (bus operators) in and around Leeds could barely raise the capital for a tram let alone the infrastructure it would run on. The two biggest employers in Leeds could lend a hand? Sorry NHS and LCC have their hands tied too and the private sector in Leeds is one of the most diverse in terms of "product" and ownership around.Reduce costs and do it on the cheap? I thought that was the intention anyway so not much to be saved there!!But then we get back to my old hobby horse for which I have to agree with Brunels comments. There is no doubt that congestion on the Otley Road corridor is some of the worst in Leeds for the 60% of the year the students are around but running parallel to it is a railway line that they intend reducing the stopper train frequency on. The Hunslet route has less congestion and with the Pontefract and various Wakefield services is probably as well served as Otley Road up until about 7.00pm. It also has a train line but criminally no station. Then we have the road infrastructure including the relatively new John Smeaton viaduct. Given this how many people are going to park up in Stourton for a 20 minute trolley bus ride to Leeds!!

BLAKEY · Post by **BLAKEY** » Mon 27 Dec, 2010 9:24 pm

Haven't these idealistic clowns - and I include the vehicle manufacturers in that - learnt their lesson from the fiasco generally referred to with derogatory intent as "the Purple Slug" ?? As far as I know these idiotic and unwieldy creations cost around £330,000 each - for less than fifty seats. Then there is all the sickening infantile hype about calling them "streetcars" - they are of course articulated buses with wheel spats and nothing more. The intention was that the "pilot" would sit in his "cockpit" away from contact with the passengers, who would have had prepaid tickets or else paid at bus stop machines. All this of course failed before it started and now the "flight crew" includes - you're expecting me to say conductors aren't you?? - "customer service hosts" !! The one advantage that these creations have over trolleybuses though is that they don't need any external expensive infrastructure - wiring, generating stations etc - but when you've said that you've said the lot. I've never been a Luddite just for the sake of it, but I fervently hope that this barmy and hideously expensive farce never gets any further than the play school colouring book stage !!