Forth Road Bridge - now in intensive care

[Sanjøy]

The bridge is being built by the private sector funded by the public sector, it will be in on time, not the early bonus winning dates as have been touted for political gain.

I am interested in the existing bridge too. Initially the new bridge was for cars and the FRB would be for public transport and HGV. IIRC the lifespan of the FRB has been diminished with the 2015 incident. Does the existing plan still hold?

The 40mph average speed cameras have been such a pita.

[Ferg]

The 40mph average speed cameras have been such a pita.

That's just to stop the Fifers from getting here too quickly...

[Stephen]

My concern is what budget do they have for maintenance once it is built, as I think it is a design and build rather than a PPP with maintenance factored in.

[campbell]

Probably peanuts. It'll be shut for emergency repairs within 10 years

[Stephen]

That's my concern.

[c8rkh]

Maybe not, the current Government has liked PFI and PPP in the past have they not? So maintenance may be included. If not, then I would guess that the Government's response would be "no need to pay or budget for maintenance 'cos it is new, isn't it?".

[thinfourth]

More likely

Its broken

Wave some flags and blame westminster

[ed]

So has the new 70mph limit made any difference?

[Stevoraith]

So has the new 70mph limit made any difference?

At 6.30am this morning (southbound), no, not really. The on-slip from inverkiething was still snarling things up.
Slightly less frustrating once off the bridge though as I was able to get the foot down and not crawl at 40/50 for two miles.

At 6pm tonight it was a big improvement. No queue to speak of and no crawling at 40/50 on the other side.

I think most of the hold-ups northbound have been made far worse by people diving along the Queensferry off lane and then over the roundabout to rejoin. If the increased limit dissuades them from doing that it’ll be a big help.

[ed]

Glad to hear, I guess the real test will be once the schools are back and everyone is back to work in the new year. Fingers crossed!

ps I still think they should embrace smart motorway technology and use the hard shoulder during rush hour......

[c8rkh]

We'll zoom over the bridge at 70mph towards Edinburgh and all will be great, until,

1.you hit Newbridge to come off for the airport when you will just snarl up faster and getter a faster build up of congestion as the cars zoom their at 70 mph - the biggest improvement there is they could make the slip on to the airport road a dedicated access to lane 1 with the newbridge r'bout traffic flowing into lane 2. But then that just moves the tailback to Gogar r'bout

2. You hit the lights in Barnton where all the faster moving traffic arrives at th 40 mph faster

One day, road planners will stop being focused on a "segment" and think about average journeys and destinations in the whole. it'll never happen in my lifetime.

[campbell]

Ze French, Germans and Swiss are quite good at that stuff.