Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

[ls1911]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(16/10/2018 06:04)M60lad Wrote:  Whereabouts was/is the Subway that linked Lime Street to St Johns Shopping Centre and is there any evidence today of where it was/is?

It went from where the main entrance steps now are to the main line part of Lime Street station to the entrance to St Johns along the same row as Sainsburys. If you come out those entrance doors of St Johns and look over the wall that's where it was with escalators taking you down to the start.
The Lime St part was filled in when the area was remodelled around the station, I'm pretty sure the rest of it was also filled in as there were worries of the road sinking at that location.

[mr t]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(16/10/2018 06:59)motormayhem1 Wrote:  To be quite frank , Queen square just isnt big enough for how many buses use it.
To make that anything like it should be to accommodate the amount of buses going through there you would need another 5 or 6 stands as Queen square reminds me of Piccadilly bus station in manchester , just utter chaos.

A shambles is a very good description. It was designed by Miserytravel to accommodate 20 buses per stand an hour, it did used to be even worse than now when it first opened, the number of buses using it, that is also why Sir Thomas Street stands were built as an "overflow" for Queen Square, so in effect there is 16 stops still, plus also obviously why the south services all got shafted with Hanover Street and stops on Great Charlotte/Elliot St. Thankfully a lot using stands 9-12 got moved out in 2008 as the queuing for the stands was hindering the inbound alighting services for years

[jon1]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(16/10/2018 06:04)M60lad Wrote:  Whereabouts was/is the Subway that linked Lime Street to St Johns Shopping Centre and is there any evidence today of where it was/is?

It was only closed about 10 years ago. There's videos on youtube. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4ETvOjCuQxI

And looking it at it isn't a surprise, it was a stinky pi** hole like most subways.

[Bevan Price]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(15/10/2018 23:31)iMarkeh Wrote:  I am shocked to hear about the subway. I wonder why that isn't open again now. It could help remove quite a few people from the crossings. I would say a bridge over Queen Square would be good but I think it would cost too much and you have too many idiots who would jump off the bridge. If it was done, you would still need the crossing but have staff watch it and only have it for buggys and wheelchairs etc. During non staff hours, close the bridge and have the crossing run as normal. It is complex but it moves people off the crossing allowing buses to flow better.

One prohblem is that a lot of people hate subways, and avoid them, especially at night /or if they are alone. The old subway under Lime St. was a dark, dingy hole, and tended to attract some rather "dodgy" types. A lot of people prefer to risk crossing roads rather than use such places.

[iMarkeh]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(16/10/2018 13:55)mr t Wrote:  A shambles is a very good description. It was designed by Miserytravel to accommodate 20 buses per stand an hour, it did used to be even worse than now when it first opened, the number of buses using it, that is also why Sir Thomas Street stands were built as an "overflow" for Queen Square, so in effect there is 16 stops still, plus also obviously why the south services all got shafted with Hanover Street and stops on Great Charlotte/Elliot St. Thankfully a lot using stands 9-12 got moved out in 2008 as the queuing for the stands was hindering the inbound alighting services for years

If the queues for 9-12 were that bad in 2008, I think it would be great to hear why Merseytravel have got 2 empty stands on that side and are cramming all routes into stands 10 & 11 rather than spreading them out.
I think the stands overall can take 20 buses per hour. It's the road which can't take 160 buses per hour

Sir Thomas Street is a good little operation but there are far too many buses crammed onto stands. Stop SD regularly ends up with a bus on stand and another waiting to load which then blocks stand SC.
Stop SB has space to load 2 buses at the same time but only has 11 buses per hour. Stand SD has 17 buses per hour yet has only space for 1 bus to load.... Simply switching a stand could solve many issues on Sir Thomas Street.

Something else which has just surprised me is the amount of taxi ranks. I never noticed until I have looked more in depth at maps around Liverpool. Why are there so many taxi ranks? Get rid of these taxi ranks and make bus stops (or make it so that buses can use the streets). Taxis can be a great way for people to get home at night but between 7am and 7pm, there are so many taxi ranks which should be non operational or merged into bus stops so that it is a bus stop 7am-7pm and then a taxi rank from 7pm-7am.
Or, another alternative is build taxi ranks underground. Just go with me on this one, it sounds a little daft but that massive Dawson Street taxi rank, if that went directly under where it is now (With entry/exit through the delivery area), you could fit a good 2-3 bus stop islands or bus stands there. Even if you moved the Queensway Tunnel buses in there, you are looking at 17 buses per hour off Sir Thomas Street and they have layover points (to some extent. depending on how timings all worked) so not only are you removing traffic off Sir Thomas Street but also off Crosshall Street and Dale Street. It's like a win win for everyone. Taxis still get where they need to, more bus stands, less buses on busy roads.

[SK15 GZG (Moderator)]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(16/10/2018 21:37)iMarkeh Wrote:  Something else which has just surprised me is the amount of taxi ranks. I never noticed until I have looked more in depth at maps around Liverpool. Why are there so many taxi ranks? Get rid of these taxi ranks and make bus stops (or make it so that buses can use the streets). Taxis can be a great way for people to get home at night but between 7am and 7pm, there are so many taxi ranks which should be non operational or merged into bus stops so that it is a bus stop 7am-7pm and then a taxi rank from 7pm-7am.

Whenever I go past a taxi rank in the city centre during the day there are usually a number of taxis waiting for a fare. Where would they wait for fares if you changed the taxi ranks into bus stops?

(16/10/2018 21:37)iMarkeh Wrote:  Or, another alternative is build taxi ranks underground. Just go with me on this one, it sounds a little daft but that massive Dawson Street taxi rank, if that went directly under where it is now (With entry/exit through the delivery area), you could fit a good 2-3 bus stop islands or bus stands there. Even if you moved the Queensway Tunnel buses in there, you are looking at 17 buses per hour off Sir Thomas Street and they have layover points (to some extent. depending on how timings all worked) so not only are you removing traffic off Sir Thomas Street but also off Crosshall Street and Dale Street. It's like a win win for everyone. Taxis still get where they need to, more bus stands, less buses on busy roads.

That will never happen. It would cost far too much money and also remove three parking spaces for disabled drivers. Where would you put those?

[MPTE1955]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues
More idealistic rubbish from some people on here, I'll start with the 79s issue with every other bus missing QS and going out through St John's Lane, that bus is every 5 minutes for a reason and you would end up with people all over the place and a delay issue wouldn't be solved so that is really silly. The taxi rank underground, really just make muggers job etc easier, so another silly idea as well as removing ranks, taxi drivers also have to make a living so just cut their avenues of doing so with less ranks in busy areas, really!!!, We have a council that is not bus friendly, which is not helping, there is no easy answer to this, you could make the QS to James Street area car free but there are car parks in between so that wouldn't work, the closure of the flyovers is not going to help this, even more so if they end up closed permanently. Truth is a really good park and ride is the answer but sites close to the centre and not one miles away like Gillmoss, something like they have in Norwich with several routes around all having their own buses, that is the way to go. But even something like that would only work if you made more of the centre a car free zone unless you were using the car parks with the disabled being the exception for obvious reasons.

[Barney]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(17/10/2018 05:37)MPTE1955 Wrote:  Truth is a really good park and ride is the answer but sites close to the centre and not one miles away like Gillmoss, something like they have in Norwich with several routes around all having their own buses, that is the way to go.

I agree that a city the size of Liverpool should have several P+R sites positioned around the city as there are several potential sites just a few miles north, south and east of the city centre.

About twenty years ago, North Western introduced a P+R service on a site on Great Howard Street opposite the Stanley Tobacco Warehouse. I used it several times but on the day it was withdrawn a driver told me that that, as the P+R was solely a NW initiative, Liverpool City Council wanted it closed and effectively evicted NW from the site.

Incidentally, the site is still derelict land and rumours are that it will be the location of a new Merseyrail station should a new football stadium ever get built at Bramley-Moore,

[MPTE1955]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues

(17/10/2018 08:50)Barney Wrote:  I agree that a city the size of Liverpool should have several P+R sites positioned around the city as there are several potential sites just a few miles north, south and east of the city centre.

About twenty years ago, North Western introduced a P+R service on a site on Great Howard Street opposite the Stanley Tobacco Warehouse. I used it several times but on the day it was withdrawn a driver told me that that, as the P+R was solely a NW initiative, Liverpool City Council wanted it closed and effectively evicted NW from the site.

Incidentally, the site is still derelict land and rumours are that it will be the location of a new Merseyrail station should a new football stadium ever get built at Bramley-Moore,

I remember that site, became the car park for the heritage market on a sunday, strange place for a rail station with Sandhill being a very short distance away.

[EDB325]

RE: Liverpool City Centre Traffic Issues
Park and Ride works best when it's associated with a tram system, as in Nottingham and Sheffield.