By Jonathan Bautz

You’ve just packed your bag after an exhausting lesson on the top floor of the JB Building, said thank you to your teacher, and you step out into the corridor. In front of you stands the doorway to the JB Bridge, a doorway leading to a smooth and easy journey to your next lesson. But a sign looms over you: ONE WAY ON BRIDGE. APPLIES TO ALL PUPILS. You think about it, briefly, check left and right. Worth the risk? And then a teacher appears. Sigh. You trudge towards the JB stairs, fighting your way through crowds of students, then climb the main building’s stairs all over again. 

Analysis by The 1509 has found that the time taken to get from JBS05 to S24, when using the JB Bridge the ‘wrong way’, is 1 minute 27 seconds. When forced to go down and back up the stairs, this rose to 2 minutes 58 seconds. For every crossing, you’re losing about 1 minute and 30 seconds. This might not seem like much, but if you miss a minute and 30 from each lesson every day, this amounts to a staggering 4 hours and 30 minutes of wasted lesson time per student per year.  

The 1509 has approached students for comment and found surprising amounts of anger and frustration at the rules. The rules have been called ‘sickening’, with students feeling ‘violated’ and despairing that the JB Bridge ‘seems useless’, and imagining a two-way system that would ‘be so much more useful and would save so much time’.  

It doesn’t have to be like this. Readers of The 1509 who have been at the school since before COVID will remember the good times: freedom to cross the bridge both ways. We have interviewed older students who remember this time, and all look back on it fondly: Jonty Edmonds commented that ‘we never experienced any issues’.  

The two-way system was changed because of the need for social distancing, but this no longer exists. As Ayush Rao points out, ‘The reason why it was initially implemented was because of social distancing, but now we’re at a point where we don’t need to worry about that anymore’. If COVID concerns no longer exist, why are we still being forced to suffer under COVID-era rules? 

One student who has been campaigning for change is John Hall, whom the 1509 recently interviewed. ‘I’ve made my position clear for a number of years now. I understand there might be a safety concern or a crowding concern, but I think there are many solutions.’ Asked why it has taken so long to achieve change, Hall understands that ‘there are some problems around crowding due to a very tight door’. 

It is this doorway that appears to be the greatest barrier to a two-way system; the bridge itself is easily wide enough for two-way traffic, but there are concerns from the SMT that the single doorway would become a bottleneck. It is impossible to deny that the doorway is indeed quite narrow, and that there would have to be some waiting either side to allow traffic to move through in both directions during peak times.  

But crowding is something that already occurs, in part due to the inefficiencies of a one-way system: the central staircase in the JB Building is packed at peak times, with masses of students fighting for space. This has led to frequent injuries and delays. Rather than cause overcrowding, a two-way system would ease it, by allowing the JB Building an outlet at the top and thereby leading to fewer students moving down the staircase. As Hall says, ‘I’ve experienced much crowding going down the JB stairs; I don’t think this is going to lighten up until both ways is introduced’. 

So, what are some potential solutions, and what is the Senior Prefect team doing to ensure that change is finally accomplished? Joe Pontin has recently submitted a detailed proposal for a two-way system that would see the central JB staircase changed to upwards only, with the right staircase being downwards only, easing congestion issues that might arise within the JB system. This proposal is now under review by staff after having been discussed at Michaelmas’ Senior School Council.  

An alternative option is to allow only the sixth form to go both ways. Clearly, this has received overwhelming support from sixth formers but would lead to frustration and disappointment among those in the middle and lower school. However, it is a more realistic proposal, given the crowding that would undoubtedly occur around the narrow doorway. Readers in the lower and middle school may have to accept this, and remember that their turn to be sixth formers will come.  

Whichever proposal is taken, it is likely that a trial phase would be done for one term before full implementation. One thing is certain: change is coming. In the words of Owen Bryant, ‘It’s a small change that would make a world of difference.’