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the Central Oxfordshire Movement and Place Framework

Oxford, Transport — March 2025
This is, roughly, the Oxfordshire Liveable Streets response to the consultation on the Central Oxfordshire Movement and Place Framework (which somewhat confusingly covers central and north Oxford).

This is an excellent set of ideas. We support both the broader goals of the COMPF project and the list of specific ideas, though the latter will need to be fleshed out with details before we can see how they will actually work. There are also a few areas we would have liked to have seen included that weren't.

The opportunities for improvement are huge. The public realm in the city centre is of quite poor standard, making it relatively unattractive for residents or visitors: central Cambridge is significantly nicer, to make the obvious comparison, as are the centres of York, Bath, or even Birmingham. (Though to be fair, some of those cities are significantly less pleasant than Oxford just outside the centre.)

Walking around central Oxford can be quite unpleasant: narrow, cramped footways, awkward and hostile crossings where people are almost forced to cross on red, too much motor traffic (including high bus flows in some locations), and poor separation from cycling.

There is also poor provision for cycling: most notably in the absence of accessible east-west and north-south routes through the centre, and the lack of any kind of safe, coherent and consistent cycling infrastructure along Banbury and Woodstock Rds.
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