GYRATORY TRAFFIC REVISED PLANS SUGGESTED FOR CATHEDRAL SQUARE

Press, Volume XCIV, Issue 28128, 17 November 1956, Page 4

GYRATORY TRAFFIC REVISED PLANS SUGGESTED FOR CATHEDRAL SQUARE

[Specially Written for the “The Press” by

C. W. Hamann,

A.C.S.E., M.1.C.E., M.I.

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There is a large body of professional opinion that argues that for reasons of safety and rate of handling traffic, the gyratory system of control is the best that has been devised so far. For efficiency it is second only to the elaborate and generally prohibitive fly-over and clover-leaf systems. Gyratory traffic flow, as opposed to right-angled intersections, has two main advantages: (1) Traffic is kept going continuously, instead of by a series of “stops” and “gos;” and (2) collisions at right-angles are avoided. Risk of. injury or damage is much less when cars are converging at a slight angle, as they do under a gyratory system. An essential requirement of gyratory traffic control is that there shall be a neutral zone or island in the centre round which all traffic shall circulate.

Another very desirable feature is that all incoming traffic should have to change direction on entering the “circus.” The island should slow down the incoming traffic by deflecting it into the gyratory flow. Let us now examine traffic conditions in Cathedral square as they are now and as they could be under a completely gyratory system. Conditions in Square In the Square itself there are 10 points of conflicting or virtually direct crossing traffic. They are marked with small circles. The north-south and south north routes for buses and the north-south route for other traffic through the middle of the Square cause confusion and delays at the north and south sides of the Cathedral on the line of Colombo street. Trouble at the south side is aggravated and indeed largely caused by the inability of the light control at Hereford street to clear the traffic from the Colombo street neck. Traffic backs up into the Square, and at times completely blocks the east-west flow. It is not unusual to see several lanes of traffic from the back of the Cathedral. some of it trying to get into the south flow into Colombo street, needlessly brought 'to a standstill. Undoubtedly the Hereford street intersection has much to do with difficulties that arise: but even without this source of trouble, conditions in the Square could be much improved in themselves. From the traffic point of view, no real problem exists. The apparently narrow throats at the back of the Cathedral are adequate for all foreseeable traffic. Eight separate reentrant corners or pockets of the Square become available for main destination picking-up and settingdown points for buses. The ghastly iron shelters which blatantly disfigure the present Godley Plot could then disappear from the middle of the Square. Whereas the Post Office would no doubt have to remain where it is for general purposes, the present arrangements for 5 o’clock postings, which can give little jov to the posters, could no doubt be moved to some other point in the city where traffic congestion might be eliminated. The sight of cars jockeying for position to park for a few minutes in front of the Post Office at 5 o’clock in the evening is amusing and indeed illuminating: but it is a sight which would willingly be forgone if a little more order should ,derive from its going. Plans for Cathedral

In exchange for snippings of land from the back and sides, the Cathedral might be granted the area which is now occupied in front by the through roadways, and also part of the present Godley Plot. How long road-level pedestrian crossings will remain workable is beyond anyone to forecast: but northsouth and even east-west subways to the Cathedral grounds would be quite feasible. One can envisage on the sunny north side of the Cathedral precincts a cloister of arched masonry construction with a green lawn, sunk slightly below the ambulatory, with perhaps a small fountain in the middle, and elsewhere a chapterhouse and such other additions as the Cathedral needs. Directly in front could be re-erected the War Memorial so that its cross of light-coloured stone could be seen from the west part of Worcester street contrasted against the darker basalt masonry of the Cathedral. Just what would be the attitudes of the Dean and Chapter and of the City Council to all this cannot be predicted at this stage. But it would seem that there is still time for something essentially practical, and at the same time something rather more worthy, to be done with the heritage that the pioneers left us.

Hereford Street Crossing

We may turn now to the annoying Hereford street crossing and recall that solutions may have to be bold and imaginative. If general traffic in the Square is to flow in the best way. there must be a free outlet to the south at Colombo street. The city is fortunate in that there

already exists in the area just south and east of the main intersection almost enough open land for a complete satellite round-about. Desirably, but not essentially, a portion of the building on the corner of Hereford and High streets could be acquired, and if cross-flow traffic were to be eliminated entirely—which also would be most desirable—the block of, Hereford street west of Colombo street would have to be made a oneway street or at least permitted to carry only such east-bound traffic as would be turning north into Cathedral square. There could then be continuous-flow traffic from the Square—some for Hereford street east, some for High street, some for Colombo street, and some, by going right round the island, for Hereford street west. Under the

existing arrangement, the south flow from the Square is constantly being stopped while the Hereford street and High street vehicles are given their turns to move. Improvement of conditions in the Square does not. however, depend on the immediate construction of this Hereford street round-about. Even if the existing lights system were to. persist—and one might fervently hope that it will not do so—the consequential pile-up which it causes in the Square would not have the same effect of blocking the eastwest flow of traffic, since it would tend to build up round the back of the Cathedral. Nevertheless boldness should prevail and the root cause of the trouble be removed.