To the Editor,
The recent decision to close Portland Terrace and East Park Terrace roads in Southampton is shaping up to be yet another disaster from the City Council. Turning these key roads into bus, taxi, and cycle-only routes simply doesn’t work. All the council has managed to do is cripple businesses along these roads and push even more traffic—and frustration—onto surrounding roads.
Now, instead of easing congestion and improving public transport, they’ve created gridlock along West Quay Road, through Town Quay, and up Millbrook Road. Does anyone in the council actually understand how people get around this city? Why should hardworking families be punished for wanting to travel by car at the weekend? The result is miles of idling cars belching out emissions, hardly the environmentally responsible outcome the council claims to care about.
And if the council is so focused on the environment, why do they roll out the red carpet for cruise ships, which pump out more toxic sulphur than thousands of cars put together? The annual pollution from cruise ships docking in Southampton is equivalent to 100,000 cars, a fact that most sensible cities use to discourage cruise ship traffic, not encourage it.
It’s time the council started listening to residents and using some common sense, instead of making life harder for everyone who lives and works here. We were encouraged to buy electric cars by the government, then told we cant drive them anywhere. At the council elections in May will any of the political parties promise to take a look into all the road closures and reverse them?
The current situation with regular weekend gridlock is beyond miserable to Southampton residents.
Yours sincerely,
Michael Anderson
Please send you letters to editor@southamptontimes.co.uk
