FOLLOWING on from Rev Susie Courtault’s letter in Tuesday's Argus “what a success Valley Gardens is” - what planet is she living on?

Valley Gardens is a total failure.

As a bus driver for the past 15 years I have seen a lot of changes and Valley Gardens is a disaster.

The whole bus lane northbound from the Pavilion to St Peter’s Church has been removed,  it’s now shared with all other traffic, cars are not allowed past Trafalgar Street, yet they are doing so and now it’s full of cars.

The road is now far too close to the King and Queen pub, you get drunks falling out into the road now.

The bus stops are now in the road instead of to the side, so if you're early and have to wait, you're now blocking the road up. The road is now full of lorries delivering and you have to go around them.

There is no cycle lane, people are now walking out all over the place there.

Cars are driving down the wrong side of the road thinking it’s two-way and there have been numerous near head-on crashes there.

So no, it has not been a success story, far from it, yes the gardens look nice but you could have done them without changing the road layout, there was nothing wrong with the old layout.

Now the council still want to press ahead with the Old Steine redevelopment, yet again there is nothing wrong with it. If it’s not broke don’t fix it.

Yet again this will delay bus travel. At present there is room for about eight buses to wait there, after the redevelopment there will be space for just one bus, so where are all the buses going to wait??

All the Pavilion bus stops will be gone, there will be just one new bus stop at the bottom of North Street. Imagine all the large groups of passengers all crammed into one stop and when loading, the bus will be blocking the road with everything backed up behind.

At present late running buses can be turned around at the Old Steine,  this also won’t be able to happen under the new layout.

Also late running buses along the seafront will not be able to turn around at the pier roundabout as this also will be removed in the plans.

We have already seen how the moving of the bus stops in North Street has caused delays, now there are plans to widen the pavement in Western Road and narrow the road, yet again this will delay buses.

The council never never learn from their mistakes, Valley Gardens phase 3 will be a disaster for buses, watch this space.

Robert Wilson

Hawkhurst Road

Brighton