No park and ride on greenfield sites

Oxfordshire County Council should not be building more Park and Rides on greenfield sites.

Commenting on the County's Local Transport Plan Councillor David Williams, Leader of the Green Group on the County Council, says:

"The County Local Transport Plan rides ignores the value of greenfield sites in most of its new Park and Ride proposals. The new Plan proposes new Park and Ride sites at Cumnor, Eynsham, Langford Lane in Kidlington, Lodge Hill, Sandford-on-Thames and a site to be determined east of Kidlington. These sites will replace existing Park and Rides at Pear Tree, Redbridge and Sea Court. The new Park and Rides are too far out from the City centre and a better plan would be to expand the existing sites, by creating decked car parking. We have seen the County throw millions into redesigning roundabouts to little effect. Money spent on the programme suggested would be far better being put into the radically-reduced Adult Social care budget.

"It's an unfortunate truth that Park and Rides actually increase the amount of traffic. For small villages on the edge of Oxford City this will produce more traffic congestion.

We do need land for food, forestry, recreation, tourism and enhancing biodiversity. We do need better leadership from all our local councils to improve walking, cycling, teleworking and the use of public transport to reduce the burden of traffic in our County. Decreasing air quality and increasing noise in rural areas cannot ever be  acceptable transport policy. The County's Green councillors will challenge these proposals at the next County Council meeting in September."