Friends of the Earth
Action Briefing June /July 1999
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Birmingham Friends of the Earth Action Briefing June /July 1999 |
Both the favoured options for a new hospital to replace the QE and Selly Oak hospitals face two major problems: finance and transport. The estimated costs of around £200m are bound to escalate, and the burden of high capital and interest repayments will threaten resources for general health care. Some estimates have put these annual charges at around £50m. This will mean not just a loss of needed resources for patient care, but also increasing control by private finance over health service decisions.
How will people travel to the new hospital? The proposed "link road" will connect two major roads, the Outer Circle and the A38 (Bristol Road). It is an illusion to believe that this will only be used as an access road. It will create more traffic in an area which already has many transport problems.
Neither proposed site is easily accessible by public transport. An essential aim of a new hospital is to make it accessible for increasing numbers of day visitors. Therefore the ambulatory service should be on a main bus route, but the two preferred options do not provide this.
During the next three months there will be a consultation period with an exhibition. - Go see it, voice your protest, and write to the Planning Department. (For details ring Pat Knowles on Tel:0121 476 5457)