A lot of my travel around Bath is done on foot – it is great for health and great for the environment. It also allows thinking time. It is well worth signing up to the news letter for Walking Works . The Mince Pie calculator is a bit of good fun but also has a serious message.

In Bath the Conservative package of transport solutions has at last been called in by the Government. Schemes based on Park and Ride do not solve traffic congestion –  they simply encourage more people to do the bulk of the journey by car. What is needed is a much bigger bus network linking the villages on a regular basis to the urban communities. Better still get more people to work were they live or move to live were they work. The problem with that in Bath is the high house price values which make them unnafordable for many. Our central government – whether Labour or Conservative – have been getting the issue of land value, employment, accomodation and transport wrong for decades though. The key is a first class public transport network – as so many European Cities can demonstrate.