Bus firms unhappy with delays caused by new junction

The new junction opened on Sunday but work is still ongoing

Bus operators in Nottingham say changes to the layout of a junction in the city centre are disrupting services.

The Maid Marian Way island - which connected the road with Derby Road and Upper Parliament Street - has been removed and replaced with a T-junction as part of an £8.97m project.

Nottingham City Transport (NCT) and trentbarton have both warned of delays to services due to the changes, with the former saying bus users have been "disproportionately affected".

A spokesperson for Nottingham City Council - a parent company of NCT - said the current situation was "temporary while works are in progress".

The city council has apologised for delays caused by work at the new junction

The new junction opened on Sunday, controlled by temporary traffic lights, and some lanes are not yet operational.

Josh Goldsmith, 22, a bus driver working for NCT, told the BBC the work is affecting passengers and journey times are now considerably longer.

"It's really become a problem since they changed the layout, and it's started to back everything up – a roundabout is a lot better than a T-junction is for traffic flow," he said.

"It should take about three minutes to get from the Victoria Centre to the terminus on various routes... but it's now taking us between 10 and 20 minutes to get through the whole thing.

"You really are sat there for quite a while, and then the passengers are on your mind, and you know they have places to be and they're the ones properly affected by this – you can see it."

The remains of a 19th Century brewery cellar were discovered during work to remove the roundabout

NCT issued a statement on Wednesday apologising for delays to services, which it said were "beyond our control".

"Since the change to the road layout has taken place this week, traffic flow in the city has much worsened, and bus punctuality has been significantly affected," it said.

"Having introduced additional buses into our network prior to the works starting in order to temper any delays, there is no way to mitigate the effects of the change to the junction across our entire network.

"Buses are taking the same amount of time to travel along Parliament Street at peak hours as they would ordinarily take to travel to the outskirts of the city.

"The changes made to the junction layout this week have disproportionately affected bus users. This is very disappointing as Nottingham boasts some of the highest bus use in the country."

'Use different routes'

Trentbarton said it was seeing "significant delays and extended wait times to many" of it services.

A spokesperson for the city council said it was trying to "balance buses, drivers, pedestrians and construction work on a very busy junction".

They added: "Despite months of planning with our partners, including the bus operators, we are seeing delays and, for this we apologise, and ask people to use different routes where possible.

"Our teams are on site round the clock monitoring traffic flow, tweaking signal timings and signage and road markings to ensure traffic is flowing through the area as smoothly as possible."