Ventnor Blog

IW Councillor Tim Hunter- Henderson, Cabinet Member for Environment and Transport has taken the decision to accept £6.2m of central Government funding to upgrade the Ryde Gateway.

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As of 1st May (Thursday) cheques will no longer be accepted in Wightlink Shops on onboard.

For those of you who weren’t aware of the change, the statement released by WightLink at the beginning of March states … (more…)

Reports in the Daily Echo today might interest Islanders who use the Lymington - Yarmouth route for crossing the Solent.

They claim that the port on Lymington port may be entirely relocated to a stretch of coastline at nearby Pennington Marshes.
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It’s often mooted that mile for mile, the Solent is the most expensive stretch of water to cross in Europe and after hearing about some of the fares being charged by Wight Link last weekend (dramatically increased from the weekend before £110) it’s quite believable.
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This has got to be a joke - the council increase the student rider by 100% then say they are keen to encourage more students to use the service. Come on! Ed

Isle of Wight Council and Southern Vectis are joining forces in a bid to make bus travel more attractive to school students. Both organisations are keen to encourage more young people to travel by public transport, and to make the experience good enough to keep young people using buses after they leave education. Building on the hugely popular ‘Student Rider’ scheme, the focus has now turned to delivering increased quality of services.
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Southern Vectis have announced yet more changes to their bus services from Sunday 20th April. This is expected to be the last major revision until September.

Service 3, in common with all other routes currently operating all-night buses, will lose its all-night service except on Fridays and Saturdays when it will retain an hourly service until about 5 o’clock in the morning.
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RYDE’S town centre managers have spearheaded a community project to smarten up the town’s bus and rail interchange. (more…)

Following the news from the government of the release of £325m from a PFI, the Isle of Wight Council has decided to take a novel approach to the problem of it’s ropey roads. During a long, late night session last night a majority of Tory councillors voted in the measures. (more…)

Many thanks to Stuart George from the IW Bus Users Group for keeping us updated on changes to timetables and prices on the Islands buses. Ed

Both Southern Vectis and Wightbus have announced fares increases from 1 April.
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Just heard on IW Radio News that The Serious and Organised Crime Unit who have been investigating the Undercliff Drive scandal, whereby several senior officers were suspended have confirmed that there is insufficient evidence to take the matter further.
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Latest just coming in on the newswires is that Transport Minister Rosie Winterton announced today that she has approved a £1.19bn Private Finance Initiative improvement package.

The Isle of Wight Council will receive £325m in PFI credits to sort out our roads over the next 25 years.

Also receiving PFI credits towards road works are Sheffield City Council with £663.8m and the London Borough of Hounslow who get £198m in PFI credits.

Councils now have to draw up an Outline Business Case with work scheduled to start in 2011.

It’s reported today in the publication, Kent Online, that the paddle steamer, The Medway Queen, a one time venue for a nightclub on the Isle of Wight, will receive £1.8m heritage lottery funding for rebuilding.

According to the article, Brian Goodhew from the Medway Queen Preservation Society, says that they’ll need more than twice that amount to do the full job on the paddle steamer.
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As well as the schools reforms being decided tonight at the Full Council Meeting, there is also the tricky subject of budgets and more pertinantly, the subsidies for the school rider.

As reported in last weeks County Press, student rider fares are set to double to £1, at a time when, as the CP states, the “50p Student Rider transport ticket is being held up as a national model”.
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Following the posting back on 4th March of changes to the Southern Vectis bus service, we have received the following information from Wightbus who wish to ensure that the record is set straight.
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Following the changes announced recently, a couple more things have just come to light about Southern Vectis services:

Firstly, they’ve decided to run the Island Coaster (was X40 last year) through the Easter period until 19 April.
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The high winds, which started late last night, will not have escaped anyone’s notice on the Wight.

We hear on IW Radio this morning that there are many trees down across the Island, the closest being on the Undercliff Drive, just west of St Lawrence Inn and also at the Western end of Seven Sisters Road also in St Lawrence.
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Many thanks to Stuart George from the IW Bus Users Group for sending through info about changes to some of Souther Vectis’ bus services which commence in a couple of weeks time. Ed

Southern Vectis have announced some changes to their bus services from Sunday 16th March.
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Five more Island councils have joined the campaign Ferry Fares Fair? It brings the total to 25.

Andrew Turner MP, who is asking the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) to investigate cross-Solent services, said the support could make all the difference. (more…)

We’re all too aware of how dangerous the Island roads can be, with very serious accidents appearing to pepper the news on a regular basis.

The Department for Transport is telling us that the most dangerous hour to be on the roads on the Isle of Wight is between 4pm and 5pm on Monday.
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At last night’s full council meeting at County Hall, Newport, council leader, David Pugh announced the council will be further embracing Green issues.

Thirteen council vehicles will be adapted to run on bio fuels (we wonder if they will be supplied by Wight Made Bio Diesel?).

They have also stated that they plan to reduce the councils CO2 emissions by 4%, with various schemes.

A Zero plastic bag scheme - pioneered in Ventnor - will be extended over the Island.

It’s great news to see that the IW council appears to be serious about the embracing the Green issue.

Latest news out of the full council meeting at County Hall is that the resident parking permit, currently at priced at £50 will be rising to £75.

We’re not sure on the details of when this will commence,We’re told this will commence in April, but regardless of that, it seems like a pretty hefty rise to us.

We couldn’t find details of it anywhere else (Council website is still stating cost is £50), but did come across this reference to a shortfall of £427,000 in revenue from car parking in the County Press article dated 13 Dec 2007.

It’s pretty strange that the parking permit should rise by 50% as, from memory, the take up of the permit by Islanders last year wasn’t taken up by large numbers.

Don’t forget that we’ll be providing live coverage of the full council meeting at County Hall tonight where schools reforms and ferry fares will be discussed.

It looks set to be one of the most interesting council meetings of the year so far, with Patrick Joyce’s motion for the council to abandon it’s current schools proposals. (more…)

Grass roots councils across the Island are adding momentum to the campaign ferry fares fare? Nineteen of the 36 parish and town councils and management committees have now lent their support to the campaign. (more…)

About half a year ago we mourned the loss of the timetable on the Island Line site that showed the complete journey between Ventnor and London Waterloo - connecting Bus Link; Island Line trains, Fast Cat and Mainland train to Waterloo.

Without this, three or four Web sites had to be juggled and compared to work out journeys.

You can imagine the _sheer joy_ of finding it elsewhere (we know, we really should get out more - but that’s what the timetable is for!).

South Western trains, that now own Island Line, have the timetable on their site. We assume the link will change as it looks pretty date specific, so if you get stuck, why not try the page that got us there.

We hear from IW Radio that due to land movement in Lower Gills Cliff Road a large hole has appeared and it is likely that the road will be closed today.

We’ll try and find out more info and let you have it when we do.

Update: We hear that this section of the road will be closed for at least a week as repairs take place.