Residents, businesses and visitors continue to benefit from improvements to travel in the city, each step contributing to creating cleaner, greener and better connected travel options for everyone.
Portsmouth City Council’s annual review of its Local Transport Plan highlights the great work of the past year including the launch of shared Beryl bikes, improvements to walking, cycling and bus routes, the return of the Southsea Park and Ride route to the seafront and more. The annual implementation plan supports the delivery of the council’s transport strategy vision.
The importance of these improvements is reinforced by the results of the 2023 Portsmouth travel survey that received over 700 responses from residents of Portsmouth. Results from this survey made clear that resident’s priority is making public transport a more attractive option.
This overview will be shared at the council transport decision meeting on the 10 August and will show how the transport strategy has been delivered, tackling air pollution, improving and developing better connected walking and cycling, making public transport more attractive and improving and maintaining the road network for sustainable growth.
The meeting will highlight the work done over the last year including:
- the award of £48 million pounds to deliver the Portsmouth Bus Service Improvement Plan, which will fund new tickets, reduce fares, and make bus journey times shorter and more reliable
- £12.6 million pounds of funding awarded to bring 62 electric buses to Portsmouth, in partnership with First bus as part of the of Department for Transport Zero Emission Bus Regional Area (ZEBRA) scheme
- continuation of an electric vehicle charging points programme to encourage the uptake of electric vehicles, which has helped to save 122.7 tonnes of CO2 in the first 3 years
- increasing the number of on-street bike hangars in streets where bike storage is an issue so more people have secure accessible bike storage close to their homes
- 16 businesses were supported by the Workplace Sustainable Travel Fund, helping local businesses make sustainable changes to the way their staff get to work including providing e-cargo bikes, installing cycle sheds and lockers
- investing in improving the connectivity of our existing cycle and walking network by adopting the Portsmouth Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plan
- continuing to expand the School Streets programme which involves temporarily closing roads to through traffic close to schools to encourage more parents and children to walk, cycle and scoot to school
- supporting the continued development of Play Streets to allow children to play outside their own homes during agreed times
- success in the National Highway and Transport Network Public Satisfaction Survey with Portsmouth coming joint 2nd out of 111 local authorities in overall satisfaction
Cllr Gerald Vernon-Jackson, Cabinet Member for Transport, will be chairing the review on Thursday 10 August 2023. He said: “At Portsmouth City Council we are committed to sustainable travel and fostering a vibrant community that thrives on environmentally friendly journey options. I am pleased to be able to review the work done over the last year that has helped towards making Portsmouth a more sustainable and prosperous city.”
For more information on transport schemes and to view the Transport Strategy please visit https://travel.portsmouth.gov.uk.
