10 January 2018
Last night's Winchmore Hill Ward Forum at the Orange Tree was by all accounts very informative and a success - apart from disruption from someone who will be standing in the council elections for one of the councillor seats in the same ward. It seems that the police even had to intervene. Probably no coincidence that the same man is the only person I've ever had to ban from the PGC forums because he persisted in attacking "the man, not the ball" and for unacceptable language........
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02 January 2018
Hostile Streets - Walking and Cycling at Outer London Junctions was published by the Greater London Authority's Transport Committee at the end of November. Shortly afterwards I went along to a meeting of Islington Living Streets to see a presentation about the report given by Caroline Russell.
Caroline Russell is one of two Green Party Assembly Members (AMs) and is a member of the Transport Committee. She was the Rapporteur for this particular study, which was carried out at her initiative........
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21 December 2017
Transcript of evidence on cycling infrastructure given by Andrew Gilligan, former Cyclilng Commission to the previous Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, to a meeting of the GLA Transport Committee on 6 December 2017.
Keith Prince AM (Chairman): It now gives me great pleasure to welcome Andrew [Gilligan], a man I worked with a few years ago when he was the Cycling Czar. He is not any more. His title is ‘Cycling Czar emeritus’ or something, in the Latin. We are now going to do a section.......
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17 December 2017
"If we could reduce speed limits to 20mph in these built-up areas then anybody who's got children, anybody who works with children, anybody who sees what we see, would have to be supporting us."
Words spoken by a surgeon at Birmingham Children's Hospital as part of a video telling a true story. Along with a policeman, an ambulance driver, a parent and the young victim of a road traffic collision, she makes the unanswerable case for 20mph limits on urban roads........
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06 December 2017
Public consultation on the draft of a new London Plan (more formally, the Spatial Development Strategy for Greater London) will run from 1 December this year until 2 March 2018. There will be a consultation event at Enfield Civic Centre on 12th January, and other events in central London. These will take the form of briefings followed by question and answer sessions. For full information about how to comment and about the subsequent Examination in Public see.......
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05 December 2017
A new report by the London Assembly's Transport Committee presents the conclusions of a study into the problems faced by people on foot and on bikes when they are faced with travelling along or crossing main roads in outer London, particularly at major intersections.
Hostile Streets - Walking and cycling at outer London Junctions concludes that even very recent junction improvements, such as removal of the gyratory system at Archway, have seriously neglected the interests of everyone except.......
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03 December 2017
A newly published study into congestion on London's roads concludes that a long-term strategic solution requires a shift to active, sustainable and space-efficient modes. Road space should be reallocated to walking, cycling and public transport; there should be distance-based road-user charging; there should be workplace parking levies; and new developments with minimal or zero parking.
Understanding and Managing Congestion was commissioned from Integrated Transport Planning.......
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28 November 2017
The draft London Plan, which will be released later this week, will include measures to encourage cycling and walking while discouraging driving. The proposals are aligned with the draft Mayor's Transport Strategy, which envisages increasing the proportion of trips in London made on foot, by cycle or using public transport to 80 per cent by 2041, compared to 64 per cent now, meaning an average of three million fewer car journeys in London each day.
The proposals have been welcomed by Dr Yvonne.......
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19 November 2017
In the UK speeding is still a major problem. It causes needless crashes, untold suffering and stops people living safe and healthy lives.
Driving is unpredictable and if something unexpected happens on the road ahead – such as a child stepping out from between parked cars – it is a driver’s speed that will determine whether they can stop in time and, if they can’t stop, how hard they will hit.
Yet newer vehicles are more powerful than ever before and reach high speeds.......
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15 November 2017
The operating hours of the Lodge Drive car park in Palmers Green are to be extended, probably from this weekend. Cars will be able to enter up until 11.30pm and leave at any time.
The failure to extend the car park's operating hours - something promised as part of the Cycle Enfield project - was raised at the September meeting of the Palmers Green Ward Forum. In an email to attendees sent out today, Councillor Mary Maguire wrote:
Please also note that following the September ward forum I.......
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14 November 2017
A multiagency "clampdown" on A10 speeding is planned, including the use of a PSPO to break up "car cruising meets"
Public responses to the proposed package of PSPO measures have been highly supportive and they are likely to be introduced
A10 anti-speeding measures
Enfield Council, the Metropolitan Police and Transport for London (TfL) have agreed a coordinated package of measures designed to address the problem of motorists speeding and driving dangerously along the A10, starting with the.......
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08 November 2017
Better Streets for Enfield have posted some comments about the Fox Lane Quieter Neighbourhood proposals on their website (republished below). These are not yet finalised, they may take on board any useful comments.
Fox Lane Quieter Neighbourhood plans
The Fox Lane Quieter Neighbourhood consultation is open, showing some innovative and promising ideas. You can see the plans and respond here, while the technical drawings are here – the closing date is 26 November.
The map in the Fox.......
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01 November 2017
Details of proposed measures to create the Fox Lane Quieter Neighbourhood were published this morning. Like last week's plans for the Fernleigh Road QN, they take a holistic approach to reducing vehicle speeds along side roads throughout the large area covered, which stretches from Palmers Green Triangle nearly all the way to Southgate Circus.
Some of the traffic calming measures are familiar from the three previous QN proposals: speed humps (confined to Fox Lane itself), road.......
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29 October 2017
Consultations are currently under way for four minor proposals that form part of the Cycle Enfield scheme:
A short section of cycle track at the junction of Bury Street West and Church Street designed to provide a safe link between the main A105 cycle lanes and the new Quietway running alongside the Salmons Brook (deadline for responses 12th November)
Bike hangars in three locations (deadline for responses 13th November).
Bury Street West/Church Street
The proposal is to provide a.......
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21 October 2017
A recently published article by "Bus Driver U" describes what the author sees as serious safety failings in the way that bus services are regulated by TfL and run by bus operators. The article includes a link to another describing a campaign for safer bus operations in London launched by an American businessman who was the victim of near-fatal collision on Oxford Street.
The anonymous driver's article - Bus Driver Fatigue—A TfL-Contracted Killer on London’s Roads? - is.......
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20 October 2017
The third set of Quieter Neighbourhood proposals relates to the "Fernleigh Road" QN - the entire area bounded by Hoppers Road, Station Road, Green Lanes and Bourne Hill. Hoppers Road does not just form a boundary, but would itself be part of the QN. There would also be measures to reduce traffic in two roads to the north of Station Road.
The consultation is open until 12th November.
In contrast to the approach taken to the Wolves Lane and Connaught Gardens QNs, the proposals are clearly aimed.......
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05 October 2017
Last week saw the first Healthy Streets conference, held appropriately enough in Walthamstow, the location of pioneering Mini Holland and Villageisation schemes. More than 300 attendees were there to explore the connections between public health and transport strategies. Topics covered included health-led street design, re-allocation of road space, behaviour change and measures to improve air quality.
Public health specialists: "Active travel is the wonder drug"
Healthy Streets is.......
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27 September 2017
The second Quieter Neighbourhoods scheme to be consulted on is for the "Connaught Gardens" QN - the triangular area bounded by Hedge Lane, the North Circular and Green Lanes. The deadline for responses is 22nd October.
I was hoping that Enfield Council's traffic planners would have studied how tremendously effective the "villages" in Walthamstow have proved, dramatically improving the liveability of residential streets by making it awkward, but not impossible, for cars to drive through.......
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26 September 2017
Enfield Council has relaunched its Quieter Neighbourhoods project (by my count, for the second time) by publishing its proposals for the "Wolves Lane Quieter Neighbourhood". Curiously, however, Wolves Lane itself doesn't even appear on the map on the consultation leaflet - it shows only Melville Gardens and streets to the east - and the suggested changes would only affect a small area around Oakthorpe School and certainly not create a "quieter neighbourhood".
Only three changes are.......
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