Forum topic: Cycle Enfield: Partnership Board to consider draft scheme this week
Cycle Enfield: Partnership Board to consider draft scheme this week
PGC Webmaster
14 Jun 2015 12:20 #1302
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On 15 June the Cycle Enfield West Partnership Board will for the first time be able to discuss some specific proposals for the implementation of cycling improvements between Enfield Town and Palmers Green, using "Mini-Holland" money provided by Transport for London.
Members of the Partnership Board, which comprises representatives of many different community and interest groups, have been sent the draft designs for the changes to roads and pavements.
Making sense of the drawings requires some detailed analysis, but compared with the only previously available drawings (those sent to TfL at the time of the Mini-Holland bid in December 2013), there are some changes that are easy to spot:
- there is more on-street parking
- along some stretches of road cycle lanes are located between the car parking spaces and the footway rather than being on the offside of the car parking space - this provides a greater degree of protection against collisions between bicycles and motor vehicles
- alternatives are proposed for Palmers Green Triangle:
- retention of the triangular traffic island, though shifted northward and with reconfigured traffic flows
- a completely new layout featuring a shared-space "Dutch roundabout"
- the creation of "bus stop bypasses" for bicycles - not drawn in on the diagrams, but the principle is that passengers alighting and boarding use an area of pavement located between the carriageway and the cycle lane.
An accompanying pre-meeting note reads as follows:
Cycle Enfield Partnership Board 15/6/15 – Pre-meeting notes
The New Design
The design team have ‘gone back to basics’ since winning the bid, have reviewed the early consultation responses, and have developed the attached new draft designs for discussion at the Partnership Board – the new principles and design will be presented at the Partnership Board.
A number of key issues were raised in consultation, and the new designs seek to address these, as summarised below.
Concerns from businesses about parking and loading in town centres.
The new designs have retained all existing loading, and the vast majority of the existing parking spaces.
The draft plans show an increase of total parking by some 15 spaces in Palmers Green town centre – there has been a reduction of 5 on-street parking spaces (from a total of 45), but a scheme is proposed to create a further 20 spaces in an improved Lodge Drive car park.
In Winchmore Hill, the draft plans also show an increase of total parking – a reduction of some 11 on-street parking spaces (from a total of 40) is proposed, but a scheme has been developed to ensure that the 71 car parking spaces in the Ford’s Grove car park (currently used by commuters) will be available for short-stay use.
Urban Realm/The Triangle/Shared space
Options have been developed that retain the Palmers Green Triangle, enhancing the sense of place, with improved public realm.
The town centre designs now use shared space principles with the cycle lane and footway adjacent to each other at the same height with different materials to indicate separation, reduced kerb heights are also used between the parking and traffic lanes. This helps maximise the urban realm space in the town centres.
There is also scope to consider 20mph zones at key locations along the route.
Congestion
It is accepted that the schemes will generate some level of congestion, but the designs have tried to minimise this, and have considered each location carefully - TfL have reviewed the results of the modelling as part of their design review.
The changed nature of the road, with enhanced public realm and potentially 20 mph zones in the town centres, is likely to reduce some element of through traffic – this will be reinforced by any mode shift to cycling and other sustainable modes.
When these issues are taken into account, the impact on overall traffic is not expected to be significant.
The draft designs
The draft designs can be downloaded from these links:
- A105 Corridor - 17 pages showing the proposed designs superimposed on detailed maps of the current road layouts
- Aldermans Hill Alternative Option - a rather misleading title, as this actually shows the alternative "Dutch roundabout" proposal for Palmers Green Triangle
- New River Route- under this proposal a cycle path would be built along the northern bank of the New River, starting at Deadmans Bridge (just south of the former Town Hall) and finishing on the North Circular (Bowes Road). Cyclists would use the existing lights-controlled crossing opposite the end of Palmerston Road. This would be an alternative to the main option, which would be for cyclists to turn out of Green Lanes into Palmerston Crescent
The diagrams below show the two alternative proposals for the Triangle.
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Cycle Enfield: Partnership Board to consider draft scheme this week
Colin Younger
14 Jun 2015 16:51 #1303
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The details of the bus stops and cycle by-passes are particularly difficult to understand. Buses seem to have to stop in the roadway (which is in effect narrower) which will cause continuous queueing behind them. I can't see whether bus passengers have a protected space to get on/off or how they cross the cycle lane. Queues are not disciplined and will spill across cycle lanes - think of the crowds at school start/finish times, and parents burdened with shopping, children, and buggies coming and going. All along I have felt that bus passengers have been neglected in these proposals, and nothing here persuades me otherwise. The loss of the stop outside the Fox is particularly annoying.
Unfortunately the plans don't make it clear what some of the lines around cycle lanes mean; exactly where are there hard divisions/armadillos? The "key" on each sheet is perfunctory and they don't help. I think the plans show some car parking between the cycle lane and the main traffic through route. If so, does this mean that passengers opening doors will risk swiping passing cyclists?
I see the Triangle Dutch roundabout alternative as a sop to those of us who wanted shared space in Palmers Green. I certainly never thought of it as an alternative to the Triangle - this merely loses a public space which all previous evidence shows residents want retained and improved. Shared space was suggested for the main shopping area to slow all traffic and allow easier pedestrian cross-road movement. We were assured that the views expressed in last year’s Palmers Green Public Realm consultation (March 2014) would be incorporated in to the cycle enfield plan, but it’s not clear how this has been done.
If the Dutch roundabout idea is acceptable in highway engineering terms for the Triangle, why not use it instead at the Fox junction? This would then signal entry to the main Palmers Green shopping area, with the improved Triangle marking the main southern gateway. It would reduce stop/start events which the newly proposed traffic lights will impose, and should also allow retention of the important Fox bus stop.
There seems to be a regrettable failure to improve the dangerous Bourne Hill/Green Lanes/Hedge Lane cross road. Cars going straight ahead north or south along Green Lanes remain at risk from vehicles turning right in to Bourne Hill or Hedge Lane. Their view of oncoming traffic along Green Lanes is obscured by queueing cars awaiting their turn to cross the main line. I've had several narrow escapes here, and I can't believe that there are no collisions on record. The informal (and risky) pedestrian crossings are retained - why, when so many other crossings are being made safer?
I can't help but think that this is more and more like a cycle superhighway, rather than what I understood was to be a measure to ease movement for cyclists on local journeys. Where is the wider public realm benefit as promised by the Palmers Green Public Realm Consultation? Is it just a hoped for reduction in airborne pollution? Whatever the issues about air pollution, and I speak as one concerned about this problem and about to replace a diesel vehicle with a petrol engined one as a result*, I don't see these plans making a significant, cost effective, impact.
Has anyone done a cost-benefit analysis and compared it with alternatives to achieve a reduction in pollution? Where's the real greening of the Triangle and Green Lanes the public realm consultation requested and earlier cycle enfield proposals promised. I stress that I’m not opposed to the plan in principle, but I would like questions to be answered before we go any further.
* Yes, I know that I could do better, but it's a start!
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Cycle Enfield: Partnership Board to consider draft scheme this week
Tom Mellor
15 Jun 2015 21:35 #1311
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Cycle Enfield: Partnership Board to consider draft scheme this week
Sue Younger
17 Jun 2015 12:03 #1314
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Meanwhile, the buses will be waiting at bus stops in the roadway for a longer time causing tailbacks behind them as the road space has been reduced (because of the new cycle lanes on both sides) to single lanes in each direction.
In addition it appears that there will no longer be raised kerbs on the pavements, which will make getting on and off more difficult. It's no answer to say that buses have adjustable height steps - they would need to be dropped at every stop, which will simply not happen and, where it does, will delay buses further.
The maps also seem to show the removal of bus lanes at Palmers Green from the Triangle southbound and going into Enfield Town. As a regular bus user I'm concerned that this will delay the buses and create a disincentive to using them - surely not the intention of Cycle Enfield. Also, I am opposed to the loss of the bus stop outside the Fox which serves residents from the feeder area along Fox Lane and to the east of Green Lanes, as well as the older residents living in Skinners Court, who need a bus stop within easy reach.
At the same time there seem to be fewer formal crossings for pedestrians under the shared space proposals in Palmers Green which may suit active residents but may be difficult for the elderly, disabled and parents with buggies and young children.
While I would welcome safer routes for cyclists It should not be at the expense of bus passengers or air quality which may be poorer if there are long queues of vehicles in the road at bus stops.
There is no stakeholder for bus passengers in this process, it's all seen though the lens of improving things for cyclists who, in any outcome, will remain a minority compared with bus passengers.
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