to Bob W.

HS2 and Metro and Sprint are all examples of the flawed 'green growth' agenda of stinking wealth and vanity projects to make Brum like Milan, Tokyo or Paris.  None are green because of the vast expense in money, finite resources and in GHG emissions.  All are wrong priorities and wealth flaunting when the money and resources must go into getting regular bus and railways as least as good and as popular as the average on the mainland of Europe.  Starting with FFPT.  Do you agree, Bob?  And the transport staff at 16 Summer Lane must be redeployed into fireproof energy insulation of the homes of the poorest and getting their apartments built on the 23,000 sq metres at Merry Hill.  Is that right, Bob?

The authorities, since 1981, only 20 years after finishing destroying the first tram network then set about destroying what was still left of the surviving railway network in Brum and the Black Country by building a second tram network on it!  Altogether, about 100 Kms of the railway network are gone for good with roads, buildings and trams that is continuing to this day with the region's second mainline railway going the same way as the first.  The first was Metro One, opened in 1999 on the Snow Hill, Wolverhampton, Shrewsbury mainline.  Phase 2 of WBHE is still planned to destroy more of the second mainline railway and taking land for housing, nature, the urban forest and my vertical guerrilla garden at Merry Hill.

Hundreds of millions of pounds in both price and in weight of GHG emissions are being spent on the immoral, foolish tram expansion that they failed to get last century but are even more determined to get this century with Street's 8 lines, 150 miles and 380 trams stops for £15 BILLION to 2040!  Last century, it was 200 Kms by 2000 AD/CE.  They got precisely 21 Kms of which 19 Kms is on the first mainline railway now lost, including the first mainline station - Wolverhampton Low Level that is now a conference and events centre.

Andy, in six years as the powerless figurehead of the W Mids Comedy Authority, has failed to get a single railway line reopened, let alone tramline.  The extremely expensive extension to Edgbaston Village started before he was elected in 2017, in the days of Centro.  WBHE is nowhere near finished but may open in 2024 but only as far as Dudley town centre!

I have spent my own money on circulating to officers and members our Nine Action Points, as here

 Nine Action Points from W Mids Climate Coalitio...

even though there is no mention of the vital importance of returning the trains to the 106 Kms (now 100 Kms!) either mothballed or freight only.  One of them is your own Kings Heath railway, Bob.  Now delayed for another 12 months, it was announced by TfWM last week!

Brum Sprint buses coming since 2010

7 December 2010

from Birmingham Post:

"Tram-style buses to hit streets of Birmingham in five years
Transport bosses said they were confident a new travel system called
Birmingham Sprint would prove so popular that it would eventually be
replaced with permanent Metro lines."

Sprint roll out means more flash, very expensive expenditure to divert from far better priorities

DUPLICATES PERFECTLY ADEQUATE BUS/RAIL SERVICES

GREEDY, UNAFFORDABLE EXPENDITURE THAT WORSENS AND QUICKENS CLIMATE BREAKDOWN

The second phase of works on the cross-city Sprint bus route linking Walsall, Birmingham and Solihull is set to get under way later this year, transport chiefs have announced.

The first phase, which saw bus lanes, priority junction upgrades and new shelters installed along the route was completed in time to transport spectators to and from sporting venues during last summer's Commonwealth Games.

The second phase will see further work along the route to complete the infrastructure ready for the introduction next year of articulated zero-emission buses on a continuous route.

This will begin with some work in Birmingham, including the upgrade of the Trinity Road and Newtown Middleway junction on the A34, and an extension of the westbound bus lane on the A45. Consultation over these works has now commenced and will run until March 24.

Sandeep Shingadia, director of strategic partnerships and delivery integration with Transport for West Midlands, said: "Research shows that more people would get the bus if the services were reliable and frequent which is why we have designed the Sprint cross-city bus route.

"When complete, this will create a single non-stop bus route linking Walsall and Solihull town centres via Birmingham and, thanks to the dedicated lanes and priority at junctions, passengers will know their bus will get them to their destination on time."

Sprint's second phase is being funded through an £88 million contribution from the City Region Sustainable Transport Settlement and developed by Transport for West Midlands.

The project has been developed with the hope of making bus travel a more convenient and attractive alternative to the car, helping to reduce traffic congestion and contributing towards climate change targets.

1 March 2023

FROM

https://www.business-live.co.uk/economic-development/second-phase-sprint-bus-route-26350174?utm_source=businesslive_newsletter&utm_campaign=west_midlands_newsletter2&utm_medium=email#comments-wrapper

Too exotic, expensive, extravagant to worsen our problems

Sprint is OTT - Metro even more so!

Use the Sprint money to bring in Fare-Free Public Transport for you youngsters, too and for everyone.  Not just my age group!

Use the Sprint money to bring in vital bus priority measures on all dual carriageway radial city centre roads as the carrot for commuters who don't need their cars for their jobs.  More road space is then made available for essential business users.

Use Sprint money and staff to insulate the homes of the poorest at a time of growing energy/climate crisis.

Sprint is far too expensive in price and in weight of GHG emissions.  Like Metro!

How do the officers decide when to go for Sprint and when for Metro and when to put in both modes?

What about bringing buses and trains up to standard and railway lines used for railway trains?

Use public money for really effective solutions to congestion, pollution and climate

Dear friends

During our excellent talk on scams from the police at Halesowen Pensioners' meeting yesterday, I woke up to how High Scam 2, and ongoing extensions of Metro and Sprint are all scams.  Let me explain:

High Scam 2 between London and Manchester goes so fast that it can only drop off and pick up passengers at two airports, with only some trains stopping at Brum and Crewe.  We have been sold the lie that it will increase capacity on the railway network and, therefore, more trains and services will be seen on the existing railway lines.  Over a hundred billions pounds in price and in weight of dangerous greenhouse gas emissions are being spent to give us a choice of either flying through the air on a plane or, on land in an HS2 train.  Why all that damage and destruction to benefit only the wealthy and plane flyers having the choice of train or plane?

As regards Metro trams costing at least £15 billion (2020 figure) for 150 miles and eight lines by 2040 this gives us:

1. flash, smart, smooth trams, certainly but, even the nationwide tram promotion group insist it is a "bus on rails".
2. The trams simply replace or duplicate buses that all need to be electric and which are already being phased in, anyway.
3. Why yet more expense, yet more climate breakdown to put buses on rails on roads when tyres on roads are perfectly adequate?
4. The idea is that you walk to the bus to take you to the train station.  You get off at your destination station for the bus to take you to your final destination.
5. On Hagley Road, Brum we will be seeing 1,000 trees and shrubs felled on the south, westbound side for the Metro extension to Bearwood.  Nature is desperately needed to slow deteriorating life support systems from the escalating climate emergency.

Sprint buses are the super duper buses that think they are trams, we are told.  BUT,

• Less than ten years ago, we were informed that, for £12 m, Sprint diesel buses were to be put down Hagley Road to Quinton on the border with Dudley borough.
• Therefore, you will still need the Platinum buses to take you on to Halesowen and Stourbridge.
• This means a change of transport mode and a delay in your  journey.
• Plus, Metro trams, along with Sprint and the regular buses all on the two lanes of Hagley Road.

INSTEAD

Use the money to give all non pensioners the free public transport that we have enjoyed for decades.

Plus, the bus priority measures on dual carriageways to speed the bus and inconvenience the selfish, thoughtless car commuters who clog up the roads for bus, lorry and other essential business users who must use their vehicles.

How can there be greater economic justice for the poor, who include pensioners, when hundreds of millions of pounds in both price and in weight of greenhouse gas emissions is being spent on these three major transport construction projects from the WMCA?

Our transport planners at 16 Summer Lane do so love their big, flash, fancy engineering projects to keep them in work.  But, they can all be redeployed into our

 Nine Action Points from W Mids Climate Coalitio...

Tim Weller - and could each of you please respond, this time?  THANKS!

Climate, cost of living, shortages and building a more sociable and humane society

Thanks for this, Katie and Ed.  For the forum, I would like you all to address what I have written here, please.  This is all about climate, cost of living, shortages and building a more sociable and humane society - starting from the bottom, for the most important citizens.

I think it is vital that all WMCA members and officers cancel any further work on tram and Sprint extensions in order for the money to be used to remove all fares from bus, train and tram operations in the West Midlands.  It has been done for me over the last 14 years, since I was 60.  It can easily be afforded for everybody from the hundreds of millions saved from abandoning further Metro, Sprint and HS2 expansion.  High Scam 2 is an unnecessary luxury of only benefit to those who do far too much travelling as it is and, only between three cities and two of their airports, too!

Those targetted for further financial help must be those having to choose between heating their homes or eating nutritious meals.  A massive insulation programme must be targetted at the worst homes occupied by the poorest.  Landlords must be forced to pay, of course.

Solar PV must be encouraged on roofs and not on fertile land that is needed for farming to give food to the local population. 

X1, X2 and Sprint

The main city centre stop for the X1 and X2 is by Moor Street Station (at the side opposite Selfridges). These services also serve the Digbeth coach station and the markets.

Phase one of the Sprint project involved the installation of infrastructure on the highways including bus lanes and junction upgrades to offer buses priority. It is these which have improved reliability of service and journey times on existing services such as the X1 and X2.

The second phase will install more of these priority measures as well as see the introduction of a direct bus service linking Walsall, Birmingham City Centre and Solihull.

Aside from this TfWM is working with partner councils on developing further bus priority measures and routes over the next five years using funding from the City Region Sustainable Transport Settlement (CRSTS). These will be announced in due course and subject to usual consultation and approval processes.

Can you please assist us by sending all future enquiries to the Customer Relations team directly via customerservices@tfwm.org.uk 

Re: 26 October CA/CANWM meeting

Dear Laura, Andy and Ed - and who was the fourth at last Wednesday's meeting, please?

REDEPLOY STAFF AND TRANSFER THE LARGESS BILLIONS FOR 150 MILES OF METRO AND UNKNOWN MILES FOR SPRINT TO HELP THOSE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PILE

The millions of pounds and the staff at TfWM/WMCA and MMA are there to help those who are suffering, NOW!

Scrapping Metro/Sprint is the first and most basic action to get more and warmer homes, heating, food, help, ambulances, to those who, shamefully, are at the bottom of our society, including migrants who must be put to work and also be properly housed.

Therefore, you cannot avoid talking transport at the Green Forum on 21 Nov that is not on transport anymore!  Do you agree?  Fare-Free Public Transport (FFPT) would help the poor and that is transport.  You are all moving in that direction and that is excellent.  The multiple crises are all linked as one.  The transport money must go for FFPT and for insulation/retrofitting and getting low cost, highly energy efficient apartments at High Plateau, Daniels Land and other overlooked sites - all for the disgracefully badly housed.

Best wishes

Tim Weller

GREENER TOGETHER FORUM ON TRANSPORT

HS2, Metro and Sprint are three very expensive and quick ways to use up finite fossil fuels and to accelerate climate catastrophe or ecocide from the burning of fossil fuels.  Is this a correct view to take?

Does the introduction of multi-modal public transport make for more changes between the different modes and, therefore, a slower journey?

Do HS2, Metro and Sprint all duplicate existing services?

Could the existing services be upgraded to make them as least as good as the average on the mainland of Europe?

Or, could road pricing deter car commuters and open up road space for essential business users, be better value for money and be more effective in cutting GHG emissions?

How do you decide when to replace a Platinum bus with Metro "bus on rails" trams and when to use, instead a Sprint bus, "the bus that thinks it's a tram"?

HAVE I GOT THIS RIGHT?  The tortuous journey from Derby to Worcester!

• You can take a passenger train from Derby to Burton on Trent.
• Freight only past the National Memorial Arboretum to Lichfield.  Therefore:
• Passengers are forced to take two sides of a triangle, via Nuneaton to get to Lichfield.
• The line from Lichfield to Walsall is built but unused and the full length may be turned into a cycle-walkway.  Therefore, hire a bike in Lichfield to get to Walsall.
• Walsall to Wednesbury section of the railway is also unused.  Therefore, catch a bus to Wednesbury tram stop to catch the Metro to Dudley bus station.
• A bus is again needed to bypass the existing but unused double track railway from Dudley Castle Hill tram stop to Stourbridge Junction railway station.
• TRAIN - AT LAST - to take you to Worcester!

Tim Weller

Greedy bosses v suffering migrants and the poor

I do hope we put migrants and the poor at the top of our agenda in tackling the cost of living crisis.  My plea in my last email that more of us bombard the decision makers to take their responsibilities more seriously does need to be followed up - PLEASE!

I heard Radio 2's Jeremy Vine Show at noon yesterday and was flabbergasted to hear that the nine greediest bosses of nine water companies, receive a total of £15 m every year of income and bonuses.  Yorkshire Water boss gets over £1 m/year and CEO of United Utilities gets a trifling £2.9 m income every year!  Check me out on

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0019j92

and 5:55 from the start.

We need to start a non-violent war on how money is stolen from the poor and migrants to reward greedy bosses who come up with far too many wrong, foolish and also very expensive climate decisions - like grandiose HS2 and flash to impress, immoral Metro and Sprint.

Invite a speaker from WMCA so that we can then question him/her about their truly eccentric, their weird and wonderful priorities.  I suggest Bob try and get their CEO, Laura Shoaf who needs to publicly defend her annual income and, certainly decisions.  And we need to attend and lobby at Andy Street's public meetings, too.  I shut up at the last one but will not remain silent at the next.

Tim

Sprint bus scheme means 3 kinds of buses between Walsall, Brum and Solihull

 Dear Mr Weller

Thank you for your email to Transport for West Midlands (TfWM) on 27 June 2022 regarding the new Sprint bus scheme.

Please see the answers to each of the questions you have asked concerning the Sprint development.

Are the 7 miles of new bus lanes at the expense of car commuters or front gardens? 

The 7 miles of bus lane have been created through a mixture of road widening, on street parking, and road space reallocation. There has been no impact on private properties.

Still the same road space for vehicles as before? 

In certain locations road space has reduced or movements prohibited for private vehicles.

How many new traffic lights installed in Phase 1? 

There are 25 traffic lights

Is there complete traffic light priority for buses to disadvantage car commuters?  In other words, every bus, Sprint or not, is favoured at lights? 

There is bus priority at all new signals for buses.

How many bus stops for Sprint in the 20 miles and how many bus stops for the other buses over the same 20 miles, please? 

There is not a ‘Sprint service’ in operation yet, so it is not possible to give this information.  

Thank you for contacting TfWM.

Crucial indicator for being a climate activist!

My apologies for missing the meeting.  Now home after granddaughter's birthday party.

I want to emphasise, for I fear I am in a minority, that opposition to HS2 extensions, Metro "bus on rails" tram extensions and even Sprint extensions, is absolutely essential as an indicator that people are genuinely convinced that anthropogenic climate change is a reality and is made worse by these totally unnecessary, over-indulgent, luxury projects.

They are highly energy-intensive in their construction.  That means highly greenhouse gas emitting.  That means an acceleration of what we are now, quite possibly seeing, as the runaway greenhouse effect.

They also divert attention away from getting trains back on our region's half-used or mothballed railway lines.

And, all fail to address the bus priority measures that are essential for modal shift from car commuting to bus, train and tram.

Please tell me if you think I am wrong and why!  THANKS!

From Kidderminster, go to all destinations north, by TRAIN, missing out on Birminghams' stations.  Please ask your MP and councillors to get behind the regional push to finish the Kiddi to Derby railway line for freight and, commuter/regional TRAINS!  NOT Metro trams and Very Light trams and cycle hire on a principal mainline railway.  SEE MAP, HERE:

 Railfuture's full map.pdf

What next after COP 26?

 What next for me is this:

To continue to target the decision-makers at 16 Summer Lane to help them to understand that only by cutting spending on luxuries like HS2, Metro and Sprint can greenhouse gases be cut. For every pound we spend, fossil fuels are implicated, such is our addiction.

So only spend to expel more GHG, by going for projects like insulating and putting PV panels on every EWS facing roof; bribing motorists out of their cars by Fare-Free Public Transport; and by Universal Basic Income scheme so that we don't have to find ecologically ruinous jobs just to keep them in food, shelter and clothing.

Building HS2, Metro and Sprint are NOT green jobs!

Is it really a green, ecologically sound job to be building a high speed railway line for a small minority of wealthy business people to travel between only four English cities and two of their airports?  Especially, when everyone else will still have to stick to the more mundane, ordinary, existing but, perfectly fast enough intercity service?

Is it really a green and an ecologically sound job to work on the second most expensive transport mode after HS2, when it simply results in, again only a small minority of people in Edgbaston within walking distance of the tram stop who do have a more direct and quicker service into the city centre itself?  Everyone on the 11 different bus routes either have a longer, slower route if they stay on the bus or, they get off and wait for the tram to take them on to Colmore Row on the edge of the city centre.

Is it really a green and an ecologically sound job to be building a First Class Sprint bus line from Walsall to Solihull?  Solihull that already has the basic transport modes of bus and train, plus the highly expensive, climate worsening HS2, Metro and the bus that thinks its a tram, Sprint.

Multi-modal transport is a mix up mish mash!

Dear friends - and our Transport representative, Trevor Eames    PLEASE RESPOND with your own thoughts/ideas/opinions!

I would love us all to campaign for a more sustainable, safer and fairer world for our children and grandchildren.

SUMMARY

Public transport continues to be divided up, broken up, into Heavy Rail trains, Light Rail trams, Very Light Rail trams and Ultra-Light Rail Stourbridge Shuttle trams.  In addition, 2nd Class buses and First Class Sprint buses.  It all means more confusion, waiting around and, as a result, a slower and complicated journey for those thinking of others and leaving the car at home.

MORE DETAIL

HS2 will, of course, reduce overcrowding for those travelling between the Big Four cities (London, Brum, Manchester, Leeds). However, the intercity stations, between the Big Four terminus city stations, that HS2 is too fast to stop at, must continue.  That means the intercity trains will continue to have priority on the intercity lines.  So nothing is gained.  If there is not enough seating on the intercity trains, put more carriages on!  And, in any case, the HS2 trains are planned to join the intercity lines up to Glasgow and Edinburgh, north of Manchester and Leeds.

First Class for the Big Four.  Second Class for all the other intercity stations missed out but, they must still have a second class service.

BUSES PUSHED OUT onto narrow roads with parked cars and diversions  

I have now checked out Broad Street.  It really is utterly impossible for buses to use that road ever again. Pavements are widened and, at tram stops, the road is narrowed further.  There are two bus shelters opposite Centenary Square but no others until you get to the 'Hagley Rd/Francis Rd bus stop on our, W side of Five Ways.  The intention is to take the tram onto Bearwood, along Hagley Road.  However, this simply means multi-modal mix up with more changes and delays.  And, at the most colossal expense in cost and in weight of greenhouse gases at a time of climate and ecological emergencies that WMCA has declared.  The money should be going for electric buses and Fare Free Public Transport for the young and middle aged, to end that discrimination against them.

Eleven bus routes travel down Hagley Road and they will all get tied up and delayed by the trams.  Far better to have electric buses directly on roads without the railway tracks needed for the "bus on rails" trams on roads and railways!

Since I moved to Halesowen in 1976, the authorities have been turning railways into roads, homes and trading estates.  Since, 1981, with the introduction of Midland Metro, they have partly rebuilt the tram network they destroyed in the 1950s with trams on two mainline railways, instead of commuter and regional TRAINS. First, railways into roads and then roads into railways, as tramways!!

The railway trains are a poor relation to the swish, smart, showpiece, super extravagant trams that keep getting involved in accidents with cars!  And tracks that need replacing after only five years, at a cost of £5 million of deadly greenhouse gases!

Tim

MULTI-MODAL MIX UP with Metro and Sprint to the detriment of trains and buses

Trams make public transport worse eg. 11 different bus routes no longer using Five Ways underpass; WBHE destroying 6.7 Kms of the Derby to Devon via Dudley railway line; taken out of use one mainline railway and station at Wolverhampton, with 4 or 5 Kms of railway line and, platform 4 at Snow Hill. What a catalogue of errors! LR and VLR has taken over one of only two north-south principal, mainline railway lines between the centre of Brum and the Welsh coast. WHOOPS!

Sprint is duplicating existing bus services when every bus must be electric, have bus priority traffic lights and on bus lanes on nearside lanes to allow cars only in the overtaking lane. And free for the young, too.

Already well to do with everything already Solihull gets HS2, Metro, Sprint plus the regular bus and railway services!

Commonwealth Games, HS2, Metro and Sprint all add to expenditure, economic growth, the exhaustion of resources and accelerate the runaway greenhouse effect. Nearly 50 C in parts of Canada and the USA this week.

THESE WARNINGS CAN HARDLY BE CLEARER OR MORE URGENT

Response to Jonathon Porritt's blog

Thanks very much for this helpful overview, Jonathon.

You talk about "legacy fossil fuels" where I write about finite fossil fuels.  What do you mean by 'legacy' and why that preference?

You speak in glowing terms of what Biden is doing in the US but what is your verdict on the UK?  We have very big spending on HS2, HS2's little sister in the West Midlands called Metro "bus on rails" trams and, Sprint?  All costing billions of pounds in deadly greenhouse gas emissions.
 
Sprint gives a 1st class bus service while still having to run a 2nd class bus service for those bus stops that the Sprint does not stop at.  Why not make both a unified 1st class bus service?

 
What is the point of HS2, Metro and Sprint?  Why not simply end the discrimination against the young and middle-aged and give them what my age group has had for nearly all of this century - regional Fare-Free Public Transport?

Pointless HS2, Metro and Sprint in unnecessarily using finite resources, adding to the heating greenhouse and continuing with nature turned into concrete, brick and tarmac.  Just stick with trains and buses only, to make for fewer changes between different modes and a faster public transport journey.

£3.5 m for each tram - must be more, now!

 Hi David

Each tram is £2.5 m with the overhead wires; £3.5 m for the trams using onboard batteries!  Those figures go back two or three years, too.  They are made in Spain, I believe.

The steel tram lines have to be replaced every 15 to 20 years.  When that had to be done for Metro One, four or five businesses on the A41 at Priestfield did so little business that they had to close for good, I understand.

The £15 billion to 2040 for the 150 miles of trams, the 8 lines and 380 tram stops would include the cost of the trams but, as with HS2 costs rising massively, the £15 billion is underpriced, I would guess and depends on how much is underground.

Last decade, at least four or five years ago, Sprint diesel buses running to and from Quinton were to be £12 m, if I remember correctly.  At that time, diesel double-decker buses were £250,000 each, I believe.  That was to be the first Sprint line.  Now, the first one is Walsall to Solihull via Brum city centre at, possibly £300m, including the electric buses.  Let me know if you find something out before me, please.

This newspaper report, below was 3 years ago when there was no mention of electric Sprint.  They were all very flash, diesel buses.

 Plans for a £279 million Sprint network have be...

 

I do love trams.  They glide along the rails and are so smooth and swish and really smart.  But, when we are facing the reality of finite fossil fuels and the uncomfortable reality of climate breakdown/instability/danger, I'm prepared to lose out on my love for trams in order to postpone ecocide.  Trams replacing only some buses and some trains are too high a price to pay, I think.  Leeds and Bristol are also wanting a tram network, I've read from UK Tram Ltd (HQ at TfWM/WMCA HQ!)

Why Metro and Sprint make everything worse!

I believe we have to prioritise fighting those projects that do the most damage to the  Climate, Ecological, Resource, Nature crises/emergency.  Those are the projects that cost the most money in finite resources exhausted and also make the most contribution to the runaway greenhouse effect.  My thinking is here:

Spending = finite fossil fuels burnt = greenhouse gases emitted = deepening climate emergency = THE END.

Therefore, the colossal expense in the expansion of Metro and Sprint both make the climate emergency, Nature crisis worse, as I have explained above and, public transport worse in Stourbridge and everyone from the West along Hagley Road.   My reasons for writing a worse public transport for Stourbridge are here:

1. Hundreds of millions of pounds of greenhouse gases are going to duplicate or replace buses and trains with Metro when what is needed are regular or normal commuter and regional trains on the principal, mainline railway from Stourbridge to Burton on Trent via Dudley, Walsall and Lichfield; and
2. existing buses, trains and trams simply need to be made fareless to end the discrimination against the young and middle-aged who, alone don't have fareless travel; and, 
3. electric buses on roads direct are greener, rather than Metro "bus on rails" trams going on railway lines on roads.
4. The railway lines on roads are made of steel that causes very large quantities of greenhouse gases to be emitted in the making of steel.
5. With Sprint coming, Stourbridge remains isolated from Brum city centre because it terminates at Halesowen.
6. With Metro coming, Stourbridge remains isolated from Dudley and Merry Hill because the tram stops at Cottage Street, Brierley Hill.
7. With the tram terminating at Edgbaston village tram stop on Hagley road, bus passengers from Stourbridge and the west have an additional delay to their journey because you either have to change for the tram or, have a longer journey by bus, all round the Wrekin via the Arena and narrow roads choked with traffic and parked cars!

Metro/Sprint simply duplicate and replace buses/trains to accelerate climate tragedy!

 Hi David

Thanks for writing.

You are absolutely and completely right and correct with every word, phrase, sentence and paragraph you have written!

Sprint was originally diesel buses but now electric.  It is planned for Halesowen (my town) but not Stourbridge, so no 9 buses will still be needed for that route, so duplicating Sprint!

 Sprint Delivery Programme March 2021.pdf

 Like for like comparison of infrastructure buil...

I've been raising the scandalous cost for very many years (since the 1990s) with very many politicians and officers.  Not a single one of them has expressed a whisper of concern or a raised eyebrow.  Andy Street came the nearest to expressing some concern, at one of his 'Ask Andy' meetings in West Bromwich in 2018 or 19, when he let me speak and I told him, quoting £75 m/Km for the Metro Westside extension to Morrisons, Five Ways.  But it made not a scrap of difference, of course.  The officers are in charge and the politicians (the vegetables and rubber stamps) do as they are told!

REMEMBER: Spending = finite fossil fuels burnt = greenhouse gases emitted = deepening climate catastrophe = THE END, ECOCIDE FOR ETERNITY (called eternal life)!

In 3 lines, the UK's longest-running, most amusing scandal in world transport history!!

In 2020, part of the UK's very last half-used but ready-built, principal mainline railway, near us was transferred to the W Mids Combined Authority for a Very Light Rail test track and two short sections of Light Rail tram line - and, proposal for an extended cycle-walkway!