I find myself, the morning after a spectacularly weird public forum session at a full council meeting* about to defend the council...
It's not strictly speaking a Green Party scheme, and technically they can claim they are just implementing something they can't now stop (not that they want to stop it, of course). The LTN craze was introduced by Boris Johnson's government as a way to stop viruses spreading (I am keeping an entirely straight face), and brought to Bristol by our darling Labour Sir Marv. So we should really be spreading the blame :).
As far as I am aware, they did consult the emergency services and at least some people with disabilities. From the response to the recent fire in Barton Hill, it looks like the former are in a captured position where they just have to nod along anything the council says, and that there were blatant untruths told about a formal 'disability forum', but evidently something vaguely consultative did happen. The 'consultations', such as they were, lasted more than a week.
The other really important point is that the council is not strictly speaking wasting funds that could have been spent on something else. The £6 million came from WECA, solely for the purpose of shoving in all those lovely, ahem, modal filters - not just aka bollards and giant plant pots but also very expensive surveillance infrastructure, which of course enables the council to fill their coffers with yet more dosh extracted from the people they are in theory meant to serve. So it's technically WECA we need to be focusing on regarding the funding.
*Where the majority of Green councillors walked out each time polite if frustrated middle class, older women and men tried to make statements about the reality of biological sex (to his credit, L Pondweed remained seated!); someone expressing scepticism at the settled nature of climate science was booed - well, booing happens a lot at public fora, I guess; I was wondering at one point if the woman in front of me was going to call the police because I touched her arm; and the Green deputy chair frankly admitted that she is fine with BCC being in a public-private partnership with a company whose largest shareholders are global corporations who invest heavily in the oil industry, in order to access money to 'decarbonise' Bristol, because that's just how things work these days.
Helen, you are spot on. It's so easy to just point fingers at the Greens, but you're right that we should be spreading the blame. The whole LTN thing is a bizarre legacy of Boris Johnson's government, a relic of those weird COVID-inspired rules that were all about keeping people "contained" under the guise of public health. And of course, our own "dear" Sir Marvin was the one who brought it here.
My main point, though, is how the Green Party subsequently took this flimsy, fear-based idea and cultivated it into a full-blown agenda. It's like they saw the green shoots of a controversial policy and decided to water them with their own ideological fertiliser. It's not just about what they inherited; it's what they've done with it. They've repackaged it as a solution for everything from climate change to making our streets "safer," even when the evidence on the ground—like the recent fire in Barton Hill—suggests it's anything but.
And on the money side, you've nailed it. That £6 million from WECA wasn't just found down the back of a sofa. It was ring-fenced specifically for this kind of "sustainable transport" project, so the council wasn't exactly 'wasting' funds in the traditional sense. But the Greens, as the main players, still had a choice in how to spend that money. The fact that they funnelled it into something so divisive, complete with expensive surveillance tech, shows where their priorities really lie. They're choosing to extract more and more from the very people they're supposed to be serving.
The anecdotes you shared from that public meeting are chilling, but not surprising. The way they allegedly dismissed emergency services and people with disabilities, the outright lies about the "disability forum," and the general air of hostility towards anyone who dares to question the plan—it sounds like a farce. The consultation process seems to have been less about listening and more about ticking a box. And the fact that they're happy to get into bed with corporations tied to the oil industry to "decarbonise" Bristol just shows how much of this is driven by a 'do as I say, not as I do' mentality. It’s all so deeply cynical.
What's really frustrating about all this is that it feels like it's all based on a similar kind of fear. First, it was the virus; now it's fear for the planet and humanity. It's this doomsday mentality that seems to justify everything, no matter the immediate and visible negative consequences. But what about human evolution and progress? Aren't we a species that innovates and adapts? Shouldn't our leaders be focusing on those things—on creating new technologies and finding clever, positive solutions—instead of just putting up barriers and making life harder for everyone? It feels like we're being told to go backwards in the name of going forward.
I just need to check if that was you writing that or AI again, John?
About the Greens, no, they didn't repackage anything. They just seamlessly picked up where Labour left off. What has been implemented in East Bristol was all planned whilst Labour had control of the council.
Apologies for having asked re AI! It's going to be incredibly frustrating going forward as humanity, but we are already at the point where it can be hard to tell! And you have more than one style of writing :).
The Greens would say they had no choice, though again of course they would not have chosen any differently.
Depending on what day it is, and my state of mind, I was either blessed or lumbered with a brain that functions between satire and seriousness that operate independently to each other. The jury remains out. Possibly never to return.
Thanks for this, John.
I find myself, the morning after a spectacularly weird public forum session at a full council meeting* about to defend the council...
It's not strictly speaking a Green Party scheme, and technically they can claim they are just implementing something they can't now stop (not that they want to stop it, of course). The LTN craze was introduced by Boris Johnson's government as a way to stop viruses spreading (I am keeping an entirely straight face), and brought to Bristol by our darling Labour Sir Marv. So we should really be spreading the blame :).
As far as I am aware, they did consult the emergency services and at least some people with disabilities. From the response to the recent fire in Barton Hill, it looks like the former are in a captured position where they just have to nod along anything the council says, and that there were blatant untruths told about a formal 'disability forum', but evidently something vaguely consultative did happen. The 'consultations', such as they were, lasted more than a week.
The other really important point is that the council is not strictly speaking wasting funds that could have been spent on something else. The £6 million came from WECA, solely for the purpose of shoving in all those lovely, ahem, modal filters - not just aka bollards and giant plant pots but also very expensive surveillance infrastructure, which of course enables the council to fill their coffers with yet more dosh extracted from the people they are in theory meant to serve. So it's technically WECA we need to be focusing on regarding the funding.
*Where the majority of Green councillors walked out each time polite if frustrated middle class, older women and men tried to make statements about the reality of biological sex (to his credit, L Pondweed remained seated!); someone expressing scepticism at the settled nature of climate science was booed - well, booing happens a lot at public fora, I guess; I was wondering at one point if the woman in front of me was going to call the police because I touched her arm; and the Green deputy chair frankly admitted that she is fine with BCC being in a public-private partnership with a company whose largest shareholders are global corporations who invest heavily in the oil industry, in order to access money to 'decarbonise' Bristol, because that's just how things work these days.
Helen, you are spot on. It's so easy to just point fingers at the Greens, but you're right that we should be spreading the blame. The whole LTN thing is a bizarre legacy of Boris Johnson's government, a relic of those weird COVID-inspired rules that were all about keeping people "contained" under the guise of public health. And of course, our own "dear" Sir Marvin was the one who brought it here.
My main point, though, is how the Green Party subsequently took this flimsy, fear-based idea and cultivated it into a full-blown agenda. It's like they saw the green shoots of a controversial policy and decided to water them with their own ideological fertiliser. It's not just about what they inherited; it's what they've done with it. They've repackaged it as a solution for everything from climate change to making our streets "safer," even when the evidence on the ground—like the recent fire in Barton Hill—suggests it's anything but.
And on the money side, you've nailed it. That £6 million from WECA wasn't just found down the back of a sofa. It was ring-fenced specifically for this kind of "sustainable transport" project, so the council wasn't exactly 'wasting' funds in the traditional sense. But the Greens, as the main players, still had a choice in how to spend that money. The fact that they funnelled it into something so divisive, complete with expensive surveillance tech, shows where their priorities really lie. They're choosing to extract more and more from the very people they're supposed to be serving.
The anecdotes you shared from that public meeting are chilling, but not surprising. The way they allegedly dismissed emergency services and people with disabilities, the outright lies about the "disability forum," and the general air of hostility towards anyone who dares to question the plan—it sounds like a farce. The consultation process seems to have been less about listening and more about ticking a box. And the fact that they're happy to get into bed with corporations tied to the oil industry to "decarbonise" Bristol just shows how much of this is driven by a 'do as I say, not as I do' mentality. It’s all so deeply cynical.
What's really frustrating about all this is that it feels like it's all based on a similar kind of fear. First, it was the virus; now it's fear for the planet and humanity. It's this doomsday mentality that seems to justify everything, no matter the immediate and visible negative consequences. But what about human evolution and progress? Aren't we a species that innovates and adapts? Shouldn't our leaders be focusing on those things—on creating new technologies and finding clever, positive solutions—instead of just putting up barriers and making life harder for everyone? It feels like we're being told to go backwards in the name of going forward.
I just need to check if that was you writing that or AI again, John?
About the Greens, no, they didn't repackage anything. They just seamlessly picked up where Labour left off. What has been implemented in East Bristol was all planned whilst Labour had control of the council.
Me, all me. Nonetheless, the Greens took that ball and ran with it
Apologies for having asked re AI! It's going to be incredibly frustrating going forward as humanity, but we are already at the point where it can be hard to tell! And you have more than one style of writing :).
The Greens would say they had no choice, though again of course they would not have chosen any differently.
Agreed
Depending on what day it is, and my state of mind, I was either blessed or lumbered with a brain that functions between satire and seriousness that operate independently to each other. The jury remains out. Possibly never to return.