Ryde Esplanade plans "stepping stone" for regeneration of area

Proposals to reshape Ryde Esplanade, as part of a £10 million project, have been branded as a stepping stone of regeneration for the area.

In a joint bid between Hampshire, Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight Council, the money has been provided by the government through the Transforming Cities Fund to improve connectivity throughout the region.

Focusing on the gateway into Ryde, Wightlink, South Western Railway and the Isle of Wight Council are all introducing plans to rejuvenate the area by changing the road entrance to the pier, the Ryde bus station layout and a dedicated pedestrian and cycleway up the pier.

With the government funding came a number of conditions to achieve value for money when investing in the Island, the council’s strategic manager for regeneration infrastructure and transport capital programme Dave Newton said.

Fundamentals that anchor the current proposals, Mr Newton said, include the scheme that will see most buses leaving Ryde via George Street to counteract the safety concerns of buses reversing.

He said: “The funding is from the Department for Transport (DfT) so this element is very much transport focused and we want to get as much value out of that as we can for the public realm.”

Getting the proposals right was a fine balance and Mr Newton said unless there was something found which would make the scheme entirely unworkable it would go ahead, although tweaks, identified through the currently running consultation, could be made.

He said: “This stage is the feasibility design and what we have found makes the project work and the feedback will help us design the next level of detail that is very much focused on the public realm, we will hear all commentary and move forward.

“There is always going to be compromise and wide, wide views so we cannot make everybody happy but the fundamentals of this is to create a great opportunity funded by the DfT to improve sustainable travel, enhance the public realm and get much better pedestrian prioritisation in the area than there currently is, which is what we set out to do.

“If we get feedback in an improved manner we will listen to that.”

However, concerns over the council’s plans to rework the Esplanade have drawn criticism from businesses, residents and a key figure of the regeneration working group.

Having resigned from the group so she could share the plans, Cathy Foulkes has raised faults with the plans for not complying with previous designs, reports from influential parties and a seeming unwillingness to change the layout.

Cathy argues that despite the funding being given for sustainable transport, there are more roads, the potential for even more traffic build-up and a lack of public amenities with the demolition of the most-used public toilets on the Island and the cafe at the start of the pier.

Using reports from public bodies and experts, the proposals, Cathy says, go against recommendations, including road layout designs from 2005 which included a roundabout to manage the level of traffic 16 years ago, but have been disregarded in favour of the current proposals, which she says will make delays significantly worse.

Historic England said, following their visit in June 2019, it would be a ‘disaster if the design of the Esplanade was based on traffic-engineering considerations’ and the council should seek to reduce the number of traffic movements along the Esplanade to create a pedestrian-friendly environment.

The Isle of Wight Council’s strategic manager for regeneration infrastructure and transport capital programme Dave Newton, however, said he would completely challenge the idea that the current proposals had been designed with vehicle engineering in mind. Also, that there is more square mileage of highway than there currently is.

He said: “While that is incredibly important and has a high priority because this is about improving sustainable transport and the funding that comes along to enable that, we have strived to, and I believe we have, hugely improved the pedestrian priority in the area.

“We have made that space much more pedestrian-friendly in these proposals, and I am open to opinions which is why we are having a consultation.”

Mr Newton said if you walk through the bus station at the moment, it feels as if you are walking through a bus car park and are not welcome, something he wants to reverse.

He said: “The buses play an important part in this but they are not entirely golden which I would suggest the situation currently is: to achieve that we have increased the amount of pedestrian-friendly space.”

The council’s consultation is running until August 3: more details can be found here: iow.gov.uk/Residents/Transport-Parking-and-Streets/Highways-PFI/Highway-Improvement-Schemes1