Rees: ‘There is no time to fail or delay’ on delivering mass transit system

Multi-billion pound hopes for a Bristol underground transport system took a tentative step forward – with the region’s political leaders formally accepting “tunnels may well be needed” below Temple Meads and Gloucester Road.

Mayor Marvin Rees has long championed a tube network, pledging in his election manifesto last year that a mass transit system would be “in the form of an underground and overground” and telling BBC Politics West it would open in “eight to ten years”.

But opposition councillors have repeatedly dismissed it as a pipedream, not least because of similar remarks Rees made back in 2017 that it would become a reality “within ten years”.

More recently, shortly after being elected West of England metro mayor last May, fellow Labour politician Dan Norris, whose remit includes transport, struck a note of caution over the estimated £4bn costs, saying his “instinct is that undergrounds cost a lot of money”, although he did not rule it in or out.

Now, though, the West of England Combined Authority (WECA) committee – comprising the two mayors and the leaders of South Gloucestershire and Bath & North East Somerset councils – have agreed to firm up costs, dates and key milestones for the region’s mass transit by their next meeting in April.

“Tunnels may well be needed” below Temple Meads and Gloucester Road to make way for the proposed Bristol mass transit – image: Bristol City Council

A last-minute amendment to the committee on Friday specifically mentioning tunnels was approved unanimously.

It said: “The committee recognises the need for new public transport across the region and will build on the previous work carried out on mass transit recognising that tunnels may well be needed in places where there are pinch-points due to the historic nature of development including for example around Temple Meads and Gloucester Road.”

Rees told the meeting at Bath Guildhall that mass transit would be key to getting people out of cars and to decarbonising public transport, but that WECA’s financial commitment appeared to be reducing.

He said: “We have had some concerns which is why we were really keen to get the commitment today.

“We feel there is a level of detail that should have been worked up by now – dates, costs, milestones.

“Progress must be quicker. There is no time to fail, no time to delay.”

He said decarbonising transport, as well as buildings, was critical to meeting the city’s and the region’s carbon zero targets.

Rees said he hoped that with the committee’s commitment and the agreed amendment that a “planned programme of work with clear indications of those dates, costs and milestones, with a clear commitment to the financing set against it” would be presented in April.

He added: “If we’re going to commit to delivering a mass transit system for the city region, we must be working over multiple-year timeframes, and the finances have to match that framework.”

Norris told the city mayor: “I’m very happy to give you those assurances about us coming back in April.

“I look forward to working with you so we give those timed, dated and costed proposals on what resources we actually need because we need resources to move this forward to get to the next stage where we deliver a new public transport system for our region.”

Adam Postans is a local democracy reporter for Bristol 

Main image: WECA presentation to Bristol City Council

Read more: West of England mayor raises doubts over Bristol underground plans 

Listen to the latest Bristol24/7 Behind the Headlines podcast: