Bus lane fines not helping city hotel

Dear Councillors Guy and Rigby – my wife and I came to Bath from July 18 to 21 for some relaxation and rest after a busy year. We are regular visitors to your beautiful city, having last stayed just before lockdown from March 8 to 11, 2020.

We stayed as usual at Harington’s Hotel in Queen Street, not only to support a small very well-run local business, but because of the level of service and personal attention.

Having been inadvertently caught by one of your bus lane cameras a number of years ago, I have taken the time to study the road system in the city centre and worked out the best routes to reach the hotel in Queens Street, and then to get to Harington’s allocated spaces in the car park at Charlotte Street. These must have continued a steady income for B&NES Council throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, even when the hotel had no customers to provide them with income to help pay these costs.

It was therefore particularly disappointing to hear guest after guest checking in at Harington’s over our short break complaining of being caught out by a new “bus lane camera” at the north end of Milsom Street. This is the obvious route to the hotel and all sat-nav systems direct people this way.

As always when we visit a UK city, I purchased the local weekly newspaper. My sincere thanks to the letters page of the Bath Chronicle of July 15, 2021, as this has resulted in this email to ask a few questions to the leader of the council and the cabinet member for transport.

On July 30, I returned my PCN by post with a £30 cheque to comply with the 14-day limit for a reduced payment, having driven down Milsom Street on Sunday, July 18.

Date of issue and posting of the PCN was July 23. A bit odd that an automated system took five working days – not very efficient. Even posted first class, presumably on that Friday.

This arrived in my post late afternoon on Wednesday, July 28, a day when I was attending an MS Teams meeting which included a presentation entitled “Nursing in a Global Pandemic”, hearing the full details of how nursing staff deal with this, especially Wave 1, where among many other feelings, they had: fear of the unknown, fear of life, fear of PPE availability.

Listing to her talk of leaving home to protect her young family and having patients die alone with nurses holding their hands did not make me feel inclined to follow up

that evening with any reply regarding such a trivial thing as a minor traffic infringement.

Still, once again I refer you to the Bath Chronicle. Page 10 in an article about extending the duration of Bath Christmas Market in which it is alleged that Councillor Guy took an autocratic decision to propose this change against the apparent cabinet discussions. Councillor Guy is quoted: “The market creates jobs and wealth for all sections ..... ” – this presumably includes the hotel sector.

Good news, more visitors – who are most likely to drive down Milsom Street to reach Harington’s Hotel and get issued with a PCN. Not helping this hard-working independent local business.

Page 21 had a letter from Jonathan Lewis, which prompted me to look further into the legality of the PCN issued on July 18 for the Milsom Street “bus lane”.

It soon became clear that the signage at the top of Milsom Street shows this as a pedestrian area, as per signs in the Department of Transport’s “Know Your Traffic Signs”, 17th impression, 2015, Page 37. There is no signage or street markings indicating a bus lane, as described in the same publication on Pages 32 to 36.

The Local Government Lawyer website states that “bus enforcement powers are not available for pedestrian areas outside of London”.

As far as I am aware Bath is not a very distant suburb of London.

Your council officers have put this extra “bus lane” in place, but as council leader and cabinet member for transport you have a duty to ensure what is put is place is legal and correct in the first place. Then to act quickly and decisively to correct any errors that come to light as soon as practically possible.

If I was a Bath resident, I would have hoped to have seen a response from the council in the July 22, or very latest July 29 issue, of the Bath Chronicle.

I do trust your parking enforcement team will act quickly and professionally in this matter.

John Barrett

by email