I had an inkling that Google Earth wasn't being completely honest with me. Maybe approaching from the east could help alleviate the gradient
I think having the Avonmouth line running through the site would have counted against it.
Are you suggesting that a new bypass is needed (at great cost to the public purse and contrary to environmental objectives) simply because satnavs aren't appropriately programmed? Surely this problem (and many others) could be solved more cheaply by better regulation of how satnavs work (though I note the point about the diesel ban which is a separate issue).
Not just "narrow country lanes" but single track lanes in places. As you rightly say "Madness".
There may be a case for some improvement, and looking at the map there indeed isn't a decent route to/from the M5 southwards, but I think quoting satnavs as a reason is putting the cart before the horse.
Or you ease the intended main route and restrict (or in extreme close) the small lanes until the software stops using them. Building more roads encourages more driving when we need to encourage more train use.
The irony is that much of that housing contains Filton workers making and maintaining aircraft. But they objected to an airport. As for Cribbs Causeway, since when were shoppers deterred by over-flying aircraft? As both Filton and Cribbs are blots on the landscape, being together sounds perfect to me.
I started threads on that in both the "Infrastructure" and "Buses & Coaches" sub-forums. The scheme is barmy, and I cannot imaging central government will accept it in its present form. I must admit I had not thought of the main route from Bristol to its airport also being severed, in addition to the the main route from North and North-West Bristol to South Bristol generally, and complete loss of access to Temple Meads Station.
Why would Bristol traffic be driving on a road out to its west to reach an airport to the south? Also, any diesel restrictions in Bristol will affect resident drivers more than airport trips so the main nuisance will be for through drivers from the M5.
The airport is south-west of Bristol, not south. To reach it either from Bristol or the M5 J18 (currenly best junction if you are coming from north or east) you would leave the city area via either the A38 or the A370. If you look at the map of these zones https://www.cleanairforbristol.org you can see that the Bristol ends of both roads fall inside the diesel car ban. Only people coming from south Bristol to the airport would avoid these points without a lengthy diversion.
Indeed. I am not interested in Airport trips myself and had not even thought about the Airport problem until Envoy raised it. I live in South East Wales and frequently make trips to Bristol, and Bedminster (south Bristol) is a good place for things like car tyres, and building materials. I am shortly going to buy a 3-piece suite from Parkes, a large furniture shop there. But I will not be going to Bedminster again if this ban is implemented because I would need to go either via W-s-M or round the east via the Bath Road area (which is a semi- permanent traffic jam), and both options are utterly unreasonable for me. The same problem will apply to anyone in north Bristol if they have a diesel car.
Hospitals are usually served by park and rides and don't have enough parking for all those who try to drive to them. Hopefully this might also mean better bus services from nearby train station. I would hope that hospital users welcome a pollution reduction measure that should see a reduction in people being made ill by pollution and also money able to be transferred from expensive city centre car park subsidy to patient care!
Yes, "the majority of Filton Aerodrome was always north of the line" but that means the rail way did indeed go through the site as @edwin_m said.
Not sure what you mean by "expand it further". Filton is or was the longest runway in the UK, and until relatively recently there was a vast empty area to the North/North-West where the Cribbs Causeway retail park and housing estates are now (they are still building them). Before the M5 was built, there would even have been room for another runway, North-West to South-East, almost as long as the East to West one. There would have been no need to "demolish maybe half of Patchway" at the time, it is a mile away - in fact an entire new housing area (Charlton Hayes) has since sprung up between the airfield and Patchway.
The ideal location of Filton as the airport for Bristol pre-dates motorway building. Railways had greater strategic importance then, and Filton is at one of the corners of the London-Bristol-Birmingham railway triangle, just as now it is also at the corner of the motorway triangle. Even back then, only someone blindfolded could have thought that Lulsgate was a good place for the airport. Lulsgate was probably accepted as Bristol's airport because at the time no-one imagined air being used for mass transport; it was assumed that the clientele would be a a few dozen VIPs and millionaires arriving chauffeur driven from a country estate.
