Letter published in The Hearald, Plymouth on 9th April 2007 regarding the continuing lack of progress on the pedestrian bridge. Signed as Transport 2000 area coordinator.

Dear SIr

It is now over eight months since the bus stop in Saltash Road was isolated from the railway station by a lorry demolishing the footbridge.

Brave souls desperate to catch a bus have worn a path through the hedge in the central reservation as they dodge the traffic to get from the station to the northbound bus-stop - the most frequently used connection. Doubtless taxi drivers are enjoying the boost in trade from less foolhardy people who arrive and simply assume Plymouth doesn't have any buses.

There is simply no excuse for the appalling indifference with which public transport users in Plymouth have been treated by the council; you can be sure that if it was a set of traffic lights that had been destroyed, rather than a pedestrian facility, they would have been replaced within a week rather than inconvenience the motorists. In the time the council has dilly-dallied they could have built a proper pedestrian-controlled crossing (with little green men, unlike those dangerous new ones in Cobourg Street) or employed a team of schoolchildren to build a new bridge out of drinking straws and sticky- backed plastic.

Now that the election is upon us, which candidate is going to be brave enough to pledge to get something done about reconnecting the buses and trains? Is there a potential councillor out there who actually cares about providing the basic services that people need? Plymouth Council should be ashamed of itself for its failure to deliver. Claiming that they are waiting for an insurance payout is no excuse, we need a bridge or a crossing NOW.

ROGER CREAGH-OSBORNE

Plymouth Transport 2000