1.2 Key Transport Facts

Before considering some key transport facts, it is important to understand the distances people are required to travel in our area and indeed the mode of transport they use to do so. Figure 1 shows the key mainland towns in our area, along with the two major cities in Scotland, Glasgow and Edinburgh, and the corresponding drive times and distances.

Figure 1 demonstrates that many trips within our area take well over one hour and any trips out with the area to major attractors such as Glasgow or Edinburgh, on the whole, take over 2 hours. For many remote rural and island residents these journey times to service centres are increased significantly by between one and two and a half hours. The infrequency and reliability of some ferry sailings represents further increases to the time spent away from home and often necessitates overnight stays. Poor weather often lengthens this time further and presents an uncertainty when travelling. Given the longer distances people are required to travel to access services than in other parts of Scotland and the fact that public transport provision in the area is relatively “thin”, it is not surprising to find that most people from our area make their trips by car.

The following key facts provide a snap-shot of transport in Argyll and Bute.

1.2.1 Infrastructure

Roads:

• There are a total of 2,323 kilometres (1451 miles) of roads in Argyll and Bute, that’s 4.5% of Scotland’s road network.
• Trunk roads provide the strategic routes to regional centres such as Oban (A828 / A85) and Lochgilphead (A83) and the A82 provides the principal route for travel to national gateways such as Glasgow and Edinburgh.
• A combination of ‘A’ and ‘B’ class roads provide regional links between the main centres in Argyll and Bute, such as Campbeltown, Dunoon, Helensburgh, Lochgilphead, Oban and Rothesay. Typically trunk roads form part of these strategic routes.
• ‘B’, ‘C’ and unclassified roads provide local access to the many towns and villages in the area. Many of these routes are single track roads with passing places, evolving from old cart tracks.
• The road network often provides the only means of access to our towns and villages.
• The condition of our road network is currently well below the Scottish average, with a significant backlog of essential works both on trunk and local roads.
• Much of the road network is no longer, “fit for purpose” – i.e. it no longer provides us with the service we expect or need, e.g. weak roads and bridges force weight restrictions to be applied impacting on the local economy.
• There are currently 27 weight restrictions on roads throughout the area, the majority of which are on the island of Mull and in Cowal. Restrictions are also imposed for height and width limits.
• Each year we spend about £5 million on maintaining our roads; this includes works such as potholing, patching, street lighting, surface dressing, scrub clearance, verge cutting and general bridge maintenance. Just under £2 million is spent each year on winter maintenance.
• Recently the Council adopted a formal Roads Maintenance and Asset Management Plan which is based on the Institution of Highways and Transportation model document. This Plan has established that we are under funded by approximately £2 million per annum.

Bridges:

• There are nearly 1,000 bridges throughout the area, ranging from simple box culverts to large steel bridges.
• We inspect bridges every 2 years and undertake appropriate works within the funds that are available.
• Many bridges in the area have essentially come to the end of their life or are not strong enough for modern day heavy goods vehicles.
• Currently 24 bridges fail to meet the national standard of 40 tonnes and therefore have weight restrictions.

C6 Carrick Bridge, south of Lochgoilhead

Street Lighting:

• The Council currently maintains over 14,000 lighting units from street lights to lit bollards.
• Presently 40% of the street lighting columns are over 30 years old and there is a significant backlog of replacement works.
• Normally we repair over 90% of street lights within 7 days of a fault being reported.

(Marine infrastructure is covered in 1.2.4)

1.2.2 Passenger Transport

• In the Helensburgh and Lomond area, Strathclyde Partnership for Transport has responsibility for the co-ordination of public transport services.
• In the remainder of Argyll and Bute the Council has responsibility for this service. Sustaining viable public transport services is difficult in such a remote and sparsely populated area. Many services operate at a relatively low frequency thus the task of integrating services is rarely easy.
• 28% of households do not have access to a car and therefore rely on alternative modes of transport to get to work or to access services such as visiting the doctors or the shops.

Bus:

• Local bus frequency is dramatically poorer than in urban and suburban Scotland. This contributes to a high dependency on the car for everyday living.

• 80% of public transport services operating in the area are subsidised by the Council.

• A bus user satisfaction survey carried out at the beginning of 2007 indicated that 47% of respondents thought there were, "just enough buses" in the their area. In addition, 37% of respondents said that they used the bus 2 to 3 times a week and 56% responded that it was, "very easy" to get on and off the bus.
• Local bus fleets continue to be upgraded to make them more accessible for people with disabilities.

Rail:

• The scenic West Highland Line from Glasgow Queen Street provides a relatively infrequent connection to ten stations in Argyll, including Oban and Bridge of Orchy.
• Parking facilities at some stations could be improved, e.g. Arrochar & Tarbet and Craigendoran.
• Only 20% of the available capacity on the West Highland Line is being utilised and track speed restrictions make the journey time unattractive compared with the same journey by road.
• Residents in the Helensburgh area have a half-hourly rail service to the central belt.

Air:

• There are three licensed airports in Argyll and Bute. These are located near Campbeltown and on the islands of Islay and Tiree. Connel Airfield near Oban and new airports on Coll and Colonsay will soon achieve licensed status.
• Both the Campbeltown – Glasgow and Tiree – Glasgow air services operate under a Government subsidy. The Islay – Glasgow service operates commercially and therefore qualifies for the Air Discount Scheme which provides a 40% discount on fares.
• These services provide either one or two flights per day to Glasgow. This varies depending on the day of the week.

Community and Health Transport:

• Community based transport, including Dial-a-Bus and voluntary car schemes, provide vital access to services in areas where there is little or no public transport or where people need some help in using transport. However, a lack of continuous funding and legislative barriers currently prevent the full development and integration of these services.

Cowal Dial-a-bus has been in operation since 1995 and carries on average 8 passengers per journey. The service operates twice a week.

1.2.3 Freight Transport

The largest volumes of freight in our area are associated with the agriculture, forestry and fishing industries. Much of this freight is transported by road over long distances in large vehicles. This traffic causes disproportionate damage to the road network and necessitates an increased maintenance effort to keep roads serviceable.

• Argyll and Bute has approximately 10% of the total UK coniferous plantation.
• Approximately 30% of our area is planted with coniferous forest. Currently 750,000 tonnes of timber is extracted annually, most of which is transported to the central belt for processing.
• To assist in protecting our fragile minor roads a network of “in-forest” and “on-road” strategic haul routes is being developed. This network establishes a series of preferred routes that hauliers use for transporting timber.
• The shipment of timber by sea and rail, to relieve pressure on our roads, has been achieved at three principal locations. (The annual volumes shipped are; Ardrishaig (sea) - 160,000 tonnes, Campbeltown (sea) - 80,000 tonnes and Arrochar (rail) - 40,000 tonnes.)

1.2.4 Sea Transport

There are 41 piers, harbours or slipways in the Council’s ownership. Almost half of these provide a transport function with the remainder providing fishing, commercial or recreational functions.

• A number of these facilities are over 30 years old and are suffering from the effects of corrosion, which is reducing their functionality.
• Approximately 17% of people in Argyll and Bute live on islands and are therefore dependent on ferry services.
• Ferries in our area also provide part of the important commuter links from Rothesay and Dunoon to the central belt.
• Over 4.5 million passenger journeys in 2005 started or finished in Argyll and Bute, accounting for 54% of the total ferry journeys in Scotland.

1.2.5 Active Travel

• Outwith the main settlements, the distances between people’s homes and the services they wish to access are often too great to allow walking and cycling in Argyll and Bute.
• In many of our towns and villages a lack of “safe” walking and cycling links reduce the opportunities to take part in active travel.
• A start has been made on creating new links from towns and villages to schools through the implementation of School Travel Plans and the Safer Routes to Schools initiative.

Children enjoying the new path to their school.

• Most people value access to the countryside and a variety of opportunities for walking and cycling exist, e.g. forest walks / cycle routes.

1.2.6 Safety

Road Safety is a major issue in Argyll and Bute where driving distances are greater than elsewhere in the country.

• Nationally 1 in 5 people have an accident within one year of passing their driving test.
• Powered two-wheelers account for just 1% of traffic on Britain's main roads but are involved in 19% of all accidents resulting in death or serious injury.
• 30% of accidents in rural areas occur in the hours of darkness.
• Vehicle speeds on rural roads tend to be higher than built-up areas and can result in more serious accidents.
• Our casualty rate per thousand population (all severities) in 2005 was 5.11, compared with a rate of 3.50 for Scotland.
• Our road casualty statistics (shown in Figures 3 - 5) demonstrate that we are broadly achieving the casualty reduction targets set by Government, but these are still, in absolute terms, at an unacceptably high level.

Figure 3 - Fatal and Serious Casualties in Argyll and Bute Figure 4 - Slight Injury Casualties in Argyll and Bute Figure 5 - Children killed or Seriously Injured in Argyll and Bute

• All of our 80 Primary Schools are actively involved in the National Cycle Proficiency Test. 75% of the schools now conduct on-road training.
• The Council continues to support the Pass Plus initiative which provides additional skills to newly qualified drivers.
• We have reduced vehicle speeds through introducing 20mph speed limits at schools and “Twenty’s Plenty” in residential zones.
• A Community Planning Partnership initiative, “DRIVESafe”, has been implemented recently to encourage employers to take a more active involvement in their employee’s safety on the road.

The Council is a partner in the "DRIVESafe" initiative

1.2.7 Other Factors

Traffic reduction:

• A comparison between traffic flows in 1998 and 2005 is shown in Figure 6. This shows that traffic volumes in Argyll and Bute are relatively low and in some locations road traffic is actually decreasing.

• Given the details in Figure 6 and the desire to grow our economy it is inappropriate to set a target to reduce road traffic within the strategy.
• Where alternatives are available we try to encourage both people and freight to transfer to alternative modes, e.g. freight distribution by rail and sea, implementation of Travel Plans for schools and workplaces and encouragement of public transport use.

Air Quality:

• As can be seen from Figure 7 air quality in the area is good and local monitoring results have remained at similar levels over the past 3 years. Monitoring will continue to be undertaken locally and any changes will be acted upon. It is hoped that the encouragement of both people and freight to alternative modes of transport, e.g. rail, bus and sea, will assist in keeping air quality in our area good.

The Red Baroness loading timber at Ardrishaig Pier

• Operators of freight and public transport vehicles are aware of the benefits of cleaner, more efficient engines in their fleets and continue to replace vehicles as funds allow. In addition, there will be a phased programme of introducing tracking systems to the Council's vehicle fleet. This will allow careful management and monitoring of data thus enhancing safety and improving emission control.

Climate Change

• The volume of reactive work carried out as a result of incidents arising from climate change (e.g. flooding, landslips, coastal erosion and storms) has increased considerably over the years.

Storm, Helensburgh Waterfront

• It is clear that the frequency and location of these occurrences will require to be monitored to establish trends in order to plan appropriate works to protect the transport network.
• The Scottish Government instigated a study focussed on developing procedures for assessing, ranking and managing the hazards associated with landslides on the Scottish road network. The report highlighted several high hazard areas, including 29km of the A83 between Ardgarten and Loch Shira..

 Pictures of a landslip on the A83 at Cairndow

• A study by the Scottish Government considered the predicted trends in climate change and the implications of these for the Scottish road network. The study highlights priority recommendations such as revising the design parameters for watercourse structures and pre-emptively clearing debris from channels in known areas of flooding.

1.2.8 Working with others in Argyll and Bute

Argyll and Bute Council works alongside many partners in their delivery of a transport service, e.g.:

• Transport Scotland
• Scottish Government
• Strathclyde Police
• Sustrans
• Private Transport Operators
• NHS
• Community Transport
• Regional Transport Partnerships