The Isle of Wight council announced earlier this week that the Floating Bridge in Cowes would be come back into service, following sign-off from the MCA.
This morning (Wednesday), the service resumed and despite the IWC saying the previous issues had been mitigated, there were reports of cars scraping on the concrete slipway as they drive on and off the Bridge. At time of publishing, the bridge is once again out of action, this time due to becoming grounded on the slipway.
Why the secrecy?
Isle of Wight council appear to be returning to the bad-old-days of the past – being secretive. This isn’t just happening to the media, but the town council (East Cowes) directly impacted by the failure of the floating bridge (see more).
On 15th May, OnTheWight asked the Isle of Wight Council,
- Who was responsible for designing the slipways?
- Was there any modelling carried out when the slipways were designed to ensure that cars could exit the floating bridge without causing damage to their cars
- Was there communication between the designers of the slipway and Mainstay Marine to ensure cars could exit without damage
Three weeks later and despite being assured answers would be sought and following-up several times for a response, the council officers have failed to provide answers to these relatively simple questions.
Why?
Other unanswered questions
A number of other questions about the floating bridge have also failed to be answered by the Isle of Wight council.
Questions about the recent collision between a yacht and the floating bridge have been left hanging, with no indication of when they’ll be answered.
Questions about the maximum speed of new bridge and how that compares with the old one remain unanswered.
And there’s more
Concerns from foot passengers about the undercover capacity on the bridge led to OnTheWight to seek answers to several questions on this subject.
Strangely, the Isle of Wight council were not able to provide details of the undercover capacity of foot passengers on the old floating bridge, only how many could travel on it when there were no vehicles.
Mayor: “Isle of Wight council need to become accountable for this”
Peter Lloyd, Mayor of East Cowes, speaking to OnTheWight about the mistakes made around the Floating Bridge said,
“Isle of Wight council need to become accountable for this.”
The council has suggested a meeting with East Cowes and Cowes town councils, but not including East Cowes shop keepers and members of the public.
Peter went on to say,
“It’s the shop keepers that are suffering. The presence of these two groups is essential.
“Over a long period of time East Cowes TC and active residents have been advising the council, as we all have daily dealings with the Floating Bridge. Sadly Isle of Wight council has completely ignored it.
“The town is suffering. The economy of this area is being hit.
“East Cowes is a peninsular without a fully functioning floating bridge. It’s cut off from the west of the Island.
“The leader of the council, Dave Stewart, and the Executive member responsible, Ian Ward, should have been down here today with the responsible council officers, to see how the issues for themselves.”
This culture of secrecy is not good for anyone and we sincerely hope that it changes.
Image: © Karl Love
