A long-awaited boost for public transport facilities in a new Derby suburb appears to include some unwanted potential bumps ahead. The planned transport hub in Boulton Moor, which would replace a scrapped long-held aim for a park-and-ride scheme, is now set to have automatic number-plate recognition parking.
Meanwhile, bus operators are said to be concerned about potential ‘delays’ caused by diverting their services to serve the new hub, though they approve of the chance to improve connections to their existing routes. The project, from Stantec, would see the facility built off Shardlow Road and Chellaston Lane in Boulton Moor, next to the A6 Thulston Roundabout.
If approved by South Derbyshire District Council, the site would include 30 parking spaces including electric vehicle charging points, a bus stop, live bus information details and travel times to key destinations, 20 cycling stands and future connections for electric bike and scooter charging. Derbyshire County Council or a bus provider would be providing the bus arrival and departure screens, the application says.
The facility forms part of a wider district centre plan for the Boulton Moor site, with facilities to support the 2,600 homes approved and under construction in the area, which includes a petrol station, shops and two drive-through restaurants and a medium-sized supermarket, all of which was granted outline approval in 2022. This forms the first reserved matters application to finalise the details of one element of the district centre.
The proposed Boulton Moor Transport Hub off Chellaston Lane and Shardlow Road
(Image: Stantec)
Last week, district councillors had bemoaned the lack of infrastructure that had been built to support the mass housebuilding in Boulton Moor, with homes built first and services as of yet non-existent, save for a primary school. Originally, a 1,000-space park and ride had been planned to support the new suburb, but support for that aim had been pulled by Derby City Council after being deemed “undeliverable”.
As a result it was pulled from the scheme in favour of a “sustainable and contemporary” transport hub.
When outline approval was granted in 2022, district planners said the developer would not be allowed to operate an automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) parking system at the proposed transport hub and must lease the land to a transport operator for 20 years. The reserved matters application says the 30 spaces planned in this application would be “monitored and controlled long stay public parking”.
It details: “It is proposed the car park will utilise a ANPR camera system alongside daily warden patrols, to prevent any unauthorised parking. In discussions with NCP, they have advised against the use of a barrier, due to ongoing maintenance costs, and barrier failure.
“All visitors must either have a valid NCP E-Permit or pay via RingGo to be authorised to park at the site. This receipt will then entitle the person using the car park to free bus travel into Derby centre.
“Electric vehicle bays will be monitored through additional ANPRs facing the electric vehicle bays to make sure that all vehicles parking in those bays are actively charging. This will make sure that all these bays are available to all electric vehicle vehicles and not used by any other vehicles.”
Outline approval had seen the landowners say an electric vehicle charging site and petrol filling station would be built on the tip of the land which the transport hub would share. The transport hub plan shows that the wider parking facility would be built to the north as planned, in a later planning application, along with a series of package drop-off and collection lockers.
A bus route for the wider site started in September, the applicants say, which stops on Chellaston Lane and existing shops opposite the site every 20 minutes during peak periods. However, planning documents submitted by the applicant claim that so far Arriva is said to have resisted diverting its route from Chellaston Lane to serve the transport hub “to avoid any unnecessary delay”.
Arriva denies this, with an Arriva Midlands spokesperson saying: “As the leading bus operator in Derby, we’re wholly supportive of plans to improve the existing bus stops on Chellaston Lane immediately adjacent the proposed Boulton Moor District Centre. The proposal includes the provision of new bus shelters, real-time passenger information displays and a signalised pedestrian crossing – and they’re all things which help make our customers’ journeys easier.
“These bus stops are already well-served every 20 minutes by our 1B service, which was introduced through the first phase of the Boulton Moor development.”
Meanwhile, the applicants claim that other operators, such as Trentbarton, which provides the Skylink service, are also said to potentially feel diverting into the transport hub would cause “unnecessary delays” and prove “detrimental”, in favour of retaining their existing stopping points – 400 metres from the hub.
However, a spokesperson for Trentbarton, which operates the Skylink service which runs along Shardlow Road to the north of the site, said: “We were briefed in 2021 on the proposal for a transport hub but have not subsequently expressed any opinion on potential variations to skylink Derby’s route. We are always happy to talk to councils and other stakeholders about our routes.”
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