Looking back now, it felt like I was hiring a pedalo for a voyage across the Bermuda Triangle.
My nerves were sailing somewhere between unease and blind panic. I was “reviewing the situashun”, as Fagin sang in the musical Oliver!
I stared with some trepidation at the best way to approach the wonderful Tivoli theatre in Aberdeen, which recently celebrated a 10th anniversary since being restored to its Frank Matcham glory days.
My grandson was appearing as Mr Bumble in Oliver! with junior Aberdeen Youth Music Theatre, and our seats awaited. I had no choice but to navigate around Aberdeen’s dreaded bus gates before I could enjoy an eagerly-anticipated family occasion.
The bus gates are blamed for driving people and businesses away, like a modern Forbidden City (the one in Beijing has four gates, by the way).
The stretches of road only open to buses, taxis and bikes criss-cross Aberdeen city centre and grip its jugular vein – the iconic yet sadly tarnished Union Street.
I wondered if everyone else was panicking like me at the thought of dodging these council tax-traps. Sorry, I meant bus gates. They have been generating millions in fines for hard-up Aberdeen council; the gift that just keeps giving.
The newest gates, launched last summer, doubled overall profits during the past two years from “experimental traffic orders” to £4.5 million.
A council boss dismissed this as a “spike” which would settle down – little consolation for those caught so far. He should be held to account each month to check his predictions.
Recruiting a team of navigators to make it across the city
It was time to consult the maps. After all, if you are going to do something, you might as well do it properly.
I was eyeing another grandson’s compass and protractor, which had been discarded on the dining table, just in case I needed them. I’d seen navigators in war movies working furiously with these while hunting the Bismarck or something like that.
Finally, I came across a bus-gate map on my mobile phone which actually made some sense.
The only thing left to do was commit this complex jumble of lines and colour codes to my memory and hope for the best. I could hardly hold up the phone map as I drove through.
Luckily, two amateur navigators in the car with me (my wife and son) guided me, after some hair-raising circuitous manoeuvres through the back streets around the Tivoli -right under the noses of the gates, but not captured in the spiteful glare of their spy cameras.
Why should going for a night out in Aberdeen feel like approaching Omaha Beach on D-Day in Saving Private Ryan? I felt so drained of energy and emotion, there was nothing left to give poor little Oliver.
Buses run on time – but visitor numbers have plummeted
Another hapless soul wasn’t as lucky as us. Heads turned as a bus driver gave an impression of falling asleep on his steering-wheel horn, and was honking like mad. Another driver had swerved at the last second to avoid a bus gate, and came to a halt straddling two lanes – blocking the bus.
The bus driver was hardly a knight of the road, but maybe a passable Mr Bumble. I didn’t think public humiliation was necessary retribution for a clumsy, panicked decision.
There are no ‘eggs’ left; shops and other businesses are shutting, and customers vanishing
The whole experience made me think about spinoff effects of the traffic changes – just as official figures showed visitors to Aberdeen had plummeted by at least half a million since the latest bus gates opened. The news seemed to speak for itself, regarding the damage caused by the council’s ill-conceived project.
Some argued the weather might be a factor; I could throw in the price of baked beans or the dazzle from the northern lights as well, but let’s be realistic.
However, the buses now run on time, after all the cars were banned.
Soothing words of wisdom arrived from First Bus Scotland’s MD about allowing the seismic changes to settle: “You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs.” But there are no “eggs” left; shops and other businesses are shutting, and customers vanishing.
Is it too little, too late for Union Street?
I enjoyed dinner at a restaurant recently; it reminded me of carefree days when you could come and go as you pleased. The business made a virtue of offering easy access on the edge of town – much more significant now with the gates in place.
Heineken recently announced a major reopening plan for its pubs, but geared to the changing habits of customers – away from city centres and into suburban bars and restaurants. Have their staff been studying Aberdeen by any chance?
We all dream of Union Street being restored to its former glory, but is it too little, too late?
The extraordinary thing is that at a time when a major Our Union Street campaign is underway, as well as council street refurbishments, the local authority blocked off major arterial routes which feed into it; a low emission zone will ring Union Street soon.
It’s like carrying out life-saving heart surgery while disconnecting the essential oxygen supply to the patient.
David Knight is the long-serving former deputy editor of The Press and Journal
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