Forum topic: Covid Streetspace: Bike lanes, school streets, low-traffic neighbourhoods and more

£80 million for emergency projects in London

The money to pay for the emergency projects in London - in total, £80 million - is being provided by the Department for Transport (DfT). £55 million is going to Transport for London (TfL) - £10 million for its own projects, the rest to be allocated to borough schemes.  The DfT is allocating the remaining £25 million directly to boroughs.

However, £80 million is a much smaller amount than the £417 million that TfL was planning to invest in borough Healthy Streets schemes this year before the coronavirus emergency struck, reducing revenue from fares to a fraction of what was anticipated and necessitating a rescue package from the government. Much planned work, such as some Liveable Neighbourhood schemes, has consequently been put on hold.

More to £2 million for Enfield, so far

Five schemes submitted by Enfield have so far been approved, with funding allocations totalling just over £2 million. The money will be spent on cycle routes, a new cycling and walking path, a low-traffic neighbourhood scheme in Bowes ward and school street schemes.

The TfL money is coming from the first tranche of the funding it will provide to boroughs for Streetspace projects, but so far only a proportion of the total money for this tranche has been allocated. Decisions about the remainder should be made within the next fortnight, and the options being considered include several more projects submitted by Enfield Council.

The successful bids, and those awaiting assessment

The projects so far approved for funding are:

• Completion of cycle lanes along the A1010 Hertford Road, as far north as Freezy Water.
• A new cycle route connecting the southern end of the A1010 cycle lanes to the northern end of an extended CS1 at the Edmonton/Tottenham boundary. The council has not revealed what route will be taken, but the map of Haringey Council's Streetspace projects on its website shows the connection running along Bull Lane, past the North Middlesex Hospital.
• Angel Walk: A project to provide an improved walking and cycling route from Edmonton Green to the new Meridian Water development in the south-eastern corner of the borough.
• The "Bowes Primary Area" low-traffic neighbourhood - a scheme to exclude through traffic from residential streets in the western part of Bowes ward - awarded £100,000 of DfT money.
• School streets outside 12 primary schools in the north and east of the borough.

The school streets schemes (referred to in an earlier document as "school streets lite") will not incorporate ANPR cameras are likely to rely on school staff being prepared to put out and take in barriers to block off streets at school start and finish times.

The council is still waiting to hear whether or not a further nine schemes will be approved by TfL, most of them actually consisting of interventions at multiple sites. This part of the list includes the Fox Lane and Connaught Gardens low-traffic schemes, though the council is evidently continuing to work on these in the anticipation that money will be forthcoming.

The information below has been extracted from the council's latest Streetspace update (though the maps are of earlier vintage).