Mother’s death on guided busway ‘such a preventable accident’, court told
Three people died in separate incidents involving Cambridgeshire Guided Busway between 2015 and 2021.
The son of an Oxfam volunteer who was struck and killed by a bus on the world’s longest guided busway said it was “such a preventable accident”, a court heard.
Three people died in separate incidents involving Cambridgeshire Guided Busway between 2015 and 2021, and a boy sustained life-changing injuries, Cambridge Crown Court was told.
The busway, which involves a modified bus being guided along a track, is a 16-mile route which uses old rail lines to link Cambridge, Huntingdon and St Ives.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has prosecuted Cambridgeshire County Council, which runs the transport link, in connection with the incidents.
The council has admitted to two health and safety offences and details were set out at a two-day sentencing hearing.
Liam Pitts was just 22 when his mother Kathleen Pitts, 52, who was on foot, was fatally struck by a bus on the busway in October 2021.
Mr Pitts said in a statement read out by the prosecutor on Friday: “I believe my mother would still be here if it wasn’t for the inherent risk built into the guided busway in Cambridge.”
He said it was “such a preventable accident” and that she was a “great mother” and a devout Christian, who attended church and volunteered with Oxfam.
Pascal Bates, prosecuting, said Ms Pitts was moving along a pathway on the guided busway near to Clare College sports ground in Cambridge “when she was struck and killed by a passing bus”.
He said she suffered “unsurvivable head injuries and significant chest injuries”.
Mr Bates said that the incident happened at a location “identical to within a few metres” to the site where cyclist Steven Moir, 50, was killed three years earlier.
Father-of-three Mr Moir died after his bike clipped a kerb separating him from the busway and he fell into the path of a bus in September 2018.
Mr Bates said the speed limit for buses at the time of Mr Moir’s death had been 56mph, and by the time of Ms Pitts’s death this had been reduced to 30mph.
He said that the death of Ms Pitts “shows the ongoing risk despite the speed reduction”.
The barrister said: “Buses were passing very close to the pathway without warning and at considerable speed.”
He said that a possible way of meeting safety standards on that stretch of the busway could be to put in a fence.
The first day of the two-day sentencing hearing, on Thursday, had been told that 81-year-old pedestrian Jennifer Taylor was killed in 2015.
Ms Taylor had got off a bus on the busway to return to an earlier stop she had missed when she was then struck by another bus while still crossing the lane, the court heard.
The county council has admitted two charges under Section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, relating to the public trying to cross the busway at designated crossings and being struck while moving alongside the busway.
Ben Compton KC, for Cambridgeshire County Council, said the authority wished to express its “profound apology and contrition for the serious and systemic failings”.
He continued: “It’s relevant that this was a novel transport system.
“There were no national design standards, only recommended practices.”
Mr Compton said construction of the busway was completed in 2009 and it opened in 2011.
