Forum topic: Building respect for the areas where we live: the relaunch of Quieter Neighbourhoods

Enfield Council has relaunched its Quieter Neighbourhoods (QNs) project, an important element of its Mini Holland bid which has been on hold since early 2015.  Leaflets will soon be posted through doors of people living in the first areas to be surveyed and it is already possible to fill in an online Residents' Perception Survey.

The thinking behind the QNs schemes is summed up on the Cycle Enfield website:

We're working with residents to make their streets quieter and safer.  By introducing a range of measures like lower speed limits and encouraging drivers to show consideration to pedestrians, we can help build respect for the areas where we live and where our children play.

Click on the map to enlargeWhen work on Quieter Neighbourhoods originally began in 2014 the intention was for each scheme to be developed by running a series of workshops at which residents could design their own schemes.  However, the delay to work caused by uncertainty about the future of the other main element of the Mini Holland scheme - cycle lanes along main roads, without which none of the Mini Holland funding would have been available - means that it is now necessary to carry out the planning more quickly.

The Residents' Perception Survey is designed to find out what concerns people have about traffic in their neighbourhood.  It can be found online at www.cycleenfield.co.uk/qn  (One thing that is unclear is whether this survey is intended for all Enfield residents or just for those in the first areas to be worked on, but that should become clear before long.)

As before, design work will proceed in parallel on several neighbouring Quieter Neighbourhoods.  Almost certainly, the first to be done will be those for which workshops were held in 2014/15, probably the "Fox Lane" and "Connaught Gardens" QNs.  The Residents' Perception Survey will run until 31st March and in parallel traffic engineers will be investigating how traffic currently moves through each area.  Then, according to the current plan, during April the designs that emerged from the earlier workshops will be adjusted to take account of the latest feedback from the surveys.

Formal consultation, including statutory elements, will be carried out in May and the final designs will be refined to take account of feedback.  A report will be issued in June and the required internal Council processes carried out.

The plan is to carry out the works on the ground during the summer and ideally to have the first two QNs in operation by the time the A105 cycle lanes are finished (scheduled for September).

To see for yourself how residential neighbourhoods can be transformed using the Quieter Neighbourhoods principles, you only need to take a tour of the "villages" that have been created in Walthamstow (see Clare Rogers' very informative article).  And anyone who visited the streets in the  "Ladder" area of Harringay last summer, during the prolonged closure of Wightman Road for bridge works, will already know how easily a noisy, dangerous and polluted neighbourhood can be restored to health.  This is not to suggest that the same "recipe" will work everywhere - each neighbourhood has its own specifics and it is important to find out what its residents wish.