APPENDIX 6
Letter to the Chairman
from the Leader of Greenwich Council
I welcome the interest your Select Committee has
shown in the planning of, and preparation for, the Millennium
Experience in Greenwich. Your timely intervention has focused
attention on the need to ensure that public transport to the exhibition
is adequately provided for. The London Borough of Greenwich is
committed to making sure that visitors to the Millennium Dome
can get there by public transport.
We support, therefore, the River Bus initiative of
the Deputy Prime Minister as well as the completion of the Jubilee
Line Extension. We still believe there is a need to facilitate
a river bus service downstream to Woolwich Arsenal and to Barking.
One further major element is needed. This is a "guided
bus" rapid transit service, called Millennium Transit, which
will run to the Dome from Charlton Station. We also intend to
link the Dome with Greenwich town centre with a similar quality
service. These two services will link the Dome with BR and DLR
services at Greenwich and Cutty Sark Stations, and with the North
Kent BR service at Charlton. The link between the Dome and Charlton
will be the only means of travel between these two points. The
Greenwich-Dome bus link will have a journey time of 15 minutes,
compared with 21 minutes on the River Bus, and 30 minutes for
visitors using the combined DLR-JLE route.
I am encouraged by the progress which has been made
in bringing Millennium Transit closer to fruition. Apart from
finance, which still causes us concern, most of the obstacles
have now been overcome. I am, however, surprised and disappointed
that London Buses have published the tender document, without
proper consultation with our officers, in terms which will not
require the operator to develop an environmentally-friendly solution,
using twenty-first century technology. The Council was represented
on the panel for the selection of the development of the Millennium
Village. There is no reason why that precedent should not be followed
in this case, and we are pressing London Buses to agree this.
Our concern is that London Buses appear to think
that a traditional diesel-fuelled bus service will be adequate.
Our very strongly-held view is that the Millennium Experience
should start as people are journeying to the Dome and that the
residents and potential residents of the Millennium Village should
be impressed by the quality of public transport available to them.
This leads me to believe that the bus service we provide should
be at the cutting edge of new technology, probably a guided bus.
I hope you will agree that London Buses need to see
this service operation in the widest context of the Millennium
Experience and its aspirations, and that the benefits of new technology
should not be subordinated to narrow considerations of economy.
We are now very close to the final deadline. No time should be
lost in getting these issues sorted out.
I hope you will find this helpful when your Committee
returns to review the Millennium Experience again.
June 1998
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