Bristol Airport: First look at the incredible new Public Transport Interchange

BristolWorld

Bristol Airport's new Public Transport Interchange has officially been opened today.  The £60 million project forms part of the Airport's £400 million transformation programme, will enable more sustainable journeys and will see around 250 public transport movements a day.  BristolWorld had the opportunity to talk with Bristol Airport's Chief Financial Officer, Andrew Griffiths, and North Somerset MP Sadik Al-Hassan, who told us about how the new facilities will impact customers at Bristol Airport and North Somerset.

Transcript

00:00So we're stood on the bus deck of the new public transport interchange which is

00:03open and efficient today. It's a real transformational project for Bristol

00:08Airport and for all the passengers who use the airport we've got more than

00:11double number of bus bays that we've currently got which makes public

00:15transport connections to and from the airport for the likes of Bristol, Bath,

00:19Western Superman, further afield into Devon, South Wales and as far as Birmingham

00:24far more convenient for passengers it's at the same level so everybody who comes

00:29in by public transport can come in at the same level and walk through seamlessly

00:33under cover directly into the terminal building. Great seating facilities, welfare

00:38areas, new Marks & Spencer's shop as well as well as a large drop-off area and 2,000

00:46additional cow parking spaces as well on site. In building this we took a hundred

00:50thousand tons of material out of the site so rock and clay. The rock has been crushed

00:56on site and been reused actually in this facility so the bedrock of where we're

01:00today has been taken from recycled materials. Also some of the materials

01:08have been recycled to other parts of the site so we've got our car park which is on the

01:12other side of the facility. The ground level for that car park has been created from the material

01:18that was removed from here. Similarly we've stored some material for future use as well.

01:22How has it been received by residents of North Somerset the news of the new public

01:28transport interchange? So there's always going to be a balance about having an

01:32airport next door. What I want to get right for the residents is to make sure

01:36that there is more positives than negatives and this is part of that

01:40journey to make sure that the airport exists with the community together for

01:46things that make North Somerset better. Improving our road infrastructure like

01:50some of the work that's going to be doing on the transport routes into the airport and of

01:53course the wider vision of mass transit that will allow large numbers of

01:58passengers to travel to the airport without the impact on our local roads.

02:02This is part of the vision for what the airport should be for the local area and

02:07balances the needs of some of the residents because we need to find a way to

02:12take more of the cars off the roads in the local area and this will allow that. This will

02:16allow more sustainable methods to get to the airport and I think as the airport has

02:21plans and visions for the future it needs to be coupled with a mass transit system so

02:26that we can have the benefits of aviation without some of the costs for our

02:31community and Bristol Airport has been great at pushing the envelope as well on

02:35sustainable fuels like sustainable aviation fuel and hydrogen and I think we

02:39need to make sure those are in the road map so I'm super proud of the work the

02:43government and the Department of Transport has been doing to help guide industry on

02:48how aviation can exist and work so we still have the benefits but without some

02:53of the carbon cost.

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