Building work has started but they don’t know how it will connect with the City! Full story in the Hampshire Chronicle here.

Ever since the site was confirmed I’d been wondering ‘Why there?’. For starters it’s on the same side of Winchester as the existing St Catherine’s P+R site and is only one motorway junction away from St Catherine’s (less than 5 minutes driving time between the two P+R parks). St Catherine’s is rarely, if ever, full so it certainly didn’t need an overflow car park. I predict that it will become a white elephant for the following reasons:

1. If the Badger Farm Road, Romsey Rd route is taken into the City it will take, at peak times, around 23 minutes to reach the Broadway (probably the busiest Winchester P+R stop) versus the 8 minutes from St Catherine’s P+R. The Railway Station is slightly quicker from St Catherine’s and the route suffers far less congestion than the Romsey Rd route. I know which I’d choose everytime to get to the Railway Station. The only users who’d benefit from the new P+R park and Romsey Rd route would be those destined for the University or Hospital. I exclude Police HQ because it didn’t even warrant having its own bus stop until around 2 years ago and now that it exists it’s rarely used. In summary there aren’t enough people who want get off on the Romsey Rd route to make it viable.

2. Using St Cross road would give similar, or slightly better, Railway station times than from St Catherine’s and could be the better choice for the Railway Station. Again the busiest stop at the Broadway would take longer. There isn’t anywhere before the Railway Station where anyone would wish to get off and a service for the Railway Station alone wouldn’t be viable.

The fact is that the majority of P+R users want to get to the shops, the Cathedral, the Railway Station or HCC HQ and the shortest P+R journey for all of these destinations is from St Catherine’s. County Council HQ staff wouldn’t be interested in a longer journey and paying for parking because the County Council provide parking space for employees at Bar End and provide them with passes to be used on the P+R buses.

Any new P+R facility should have been located on the Stockbridge side of the City so that intending P+R users from that side of the City wouldn’t have a long drive around Winchester to get to one of the two neighbouring P+R’s or, drive though the City to a P+R car park thereby adding to the congestion P+R tries to diminsh!

�7.1m to build it down the drain! Plus, ongoing operating losses because parking charge income will go nowhere near to covering operating costs. The only winners will be the bus company paid to run the bus services and the contractors building this white elephant.