WIREDGOV

Located just off the A48 in Pentwyn, the Cardiff East Park and Ride has 300 car parking spaces, with buses running direct to Dumfries Place in the city centre at the end of Queen Street via a dedicated bus lane. The 15 minute journey will offer people a quick and environmentally friendly way of travelling into Cardiff city centre.

The scheme is part of the wider Assembly Government funded initiative to make Cardiff the first Sustainable Travel Town in Wales as announced by Mr Jones, who is also the Minister for the Economy and Transport, in March this year.

As well as the Park and Ride other key elements of the project include a free bike hire scheme, free city centre circular buses and a package of measures to tackle congestion. All this has been made possible thanks to a £28.5 million joint investment by the Welsh Assembly Government and Cardiff Council.

The investment over the next two years will transform the way people travel to, and around the capital, and will include the go-ahead for the Pont-y-Werin bridge, a new walking and cycle crossing of the Ely river between Penarth and the Sports Village complex.

The Minister said that he hoped the scheme, which is funded by £14.5million from the Welsh Assembly Government and £14million from Cardiff Council, could involve further phases after the initial two year period.

Mr Jones said:

"Cardiff was chosen as the first place to benefit from this substantial investment to create a sustainable urban transport system, but we are very confident that this project could shortly be introduced in other urban areas in Wales.

"Commuter levels in and around Cardiff have increased significantly over the past few years. This is an exciting opportunity to develop and implement a range of innovative transport solutions which will benefit the 210,000 people who travel into the city on a daily basis. We are already seeing huge strides."

The plan includes a combination of infrastructure and service improvements which aim to cut congestion in the city and improve local and regional access.

The infrastructure improvements include developing better bus corridors, the future pedestrianisation of High Street / St Mary Street, and a free city centre bus with connections to the Bay. Earlier this month Cardiff’s new ‘bus box’, was opened to link existing routes with new shopping facilities in the city and will offer the public another real alternative to using their cars.

Last month, Cardiff launched its very own "Paris-style" cycle rental scheme, which enables users to pick up and drop off bikes at new hire stations dotted around the city for a small mileage charge, and is already proving to be a huge success.

And work is now well under way on the Pont-Y-Werin bridge, a £5m construction across the River Ely, connecting Penarth with the International Sports Village in Cardiff Bay. With the piling on the riverbed completed and the bridge band currently being fabricated, it is estimated that “The People’s Bridge” will be ready for use by pedestrians and cyclists in the summer of 2010.

The Deputy First Minister will shortly be announcing a further three towns in Wales which have been chosen as the next Sustainable Travel Towns, which could also benefit from multimillion pound investments in a range of sustainable transport measures.

If successful, this innovative concept could be rolled out across Wales.