The surprising thing about the developing proposals for Connecting Oxfordshire is not the bus tunnel, but the lack of proposals for addressing the existing, terrible congestion.

The latest census data shows that people are switching from car to cycling and walking within the city.

Car-commuting within Oxford has dropped by about a quarter since 2001, so the proposals to improve conditions for walking and cycling obviously make sense. But the same data also shows that car-commuting into Oxford is increasing. We haven’t managed to persuade people to use public transport in sufficient numbers.

That is why congestion is getting worse.

Today’s letters

The sticking-plaster improvements to the ring-road roundabouts won’t fix the problem; what we need is a substantial improvement to the public transport offer into the city, particularly from Abingdon and Witney. But on this, Connecting Oxfordshire is silent, preferring to talk about new developments in the “Eastern Arc”.

The county should lay out the options, from re-opening the railways to Witney and Abingdon, through miles of bus lanes along the A34 and A40, to the simplest – closing Botley Road to through traffic, thereby giving the buses a clear run.

Closing Botley Road to through traffic would be a radical step, but it would probably get us to a reasonable solution a lot more quickly, and very much more affordably than building bus lanes and expanding roundabouts.

Perhaps it’s time to break the gridlock.

Richard Mann

Oatlands Road

Oxford

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