Quietways design decision withdrawn to take on board our concerns and ensure public engagement

We are pleased to announce that thanks to our intervention the Quietways design decision has been withdrawn to allow for designs to be revisited and full consultation with residents.

We have been working hard for the last two years to ensure the designs meet the needs of residents and the local community, whether they live, walk, work and/ or cycle locally. Our approach has been consistent – to work with you and ensure there is opportunity for local residents to shape the design.

We have emphasised throughout to officers, colleagues and TfL that proper consultation is the only way to ensure a scheme which people want and will use, and which makes the roads safer and more pleasant. This is why over the last two years we organised public meetings, met with resident groups regularly, and pushed officers to take on board concerns. We have listened to your feedback and agreed that the designs weren’t good enough, which is why we submitted our call-in.

A call-in is a final resort, so we did not rush into that without meeting with officers and the cabinet member first, where we expressed our concerns and asked that we work together to resolve issues.

Thanks to our willingness to engage with the cabinet member and officers, they have therefore agreed to withdraw the decision in order to take on board our points. They have committed to work with us to –

– revisit it the responses to the last consultation
– revise the project plan and timeline to include a 4-6 week public engagement period
– put in place a process so that as your local councillors we have greater input into designs
– review the engagement process for future transport projects so that this problem doesn’t arise again

We are pleased that this means, instead of time consuming and confrontational scrutiny meetings, we can get on with working with you to improve the scheme.

We are meeting officers and the cabinet member tonight to discuss the next steps, so we will also be going ahead with our public meeting tomorrow, on Tuesday 27 June at Rosendale School from 6.30-8pm to hear your concerns and contributions and share the details of those next steps.

If you cannot attend, or would like us to come along to discuss this at your local resident or community group meetings, please reply to this email and we would be happy to meet with you separately.

Earlier this year, one of our local residents, Jaz, was tragically killed crossing Thurlow Park Road on the zebra crossing at the bottom of Birkbeck Hill. This is not the first accident on the South Circular, and we want to work with Transport for London and local residents to make it the last.

Together with local residents, we want to find a way to improve safety at this dangerous crossing and so arranged a walkabout in March with Jaz’s friends and neighbours, local residents and parents, TfL officers, our local Assembly Member Flo Eshalomi and MP Helen Hayes.

The walkabout was attended by around 25 people and was followed by a meeting to discuss potential solutions.

During the walkabout a number of points were highlighted; the possible need for a countdown timer on the crossing, the general speed of drivers rushing to ‘get away’ from the gyratory junction, the fact that the two lanes moving away from Tulse Hill move into one lane occurs fairly quickly with little signage pre-warning drivers of that change, the shift in speed limit around the neighbouring roads between 20mph (Lambeth) and 30mph (TfL) and lack of driver awareness of the change, that the sunlight both in the morning and the afternoon can be blinding to drivers as they approach the bridge /crossing, which makes it hard for drivers to see people waiting to cross, and that cycle lane improvement might also help.

During the meeting that followed the walkabout there was a general conversation about what TfL thought was causing the safety concerns, the data surrounding TfL’s understanding of the safety concerns, and what the local community could do to support TfL’s understanding of the safety concerns.

Otherwise, there was also a conversation about what necessary criteria was required for TfL to make certain safety changes, while there was also a discussion about whether some test speed measures could be put in place down.

Furthermore, the group talked about the general need for better signage and better visibility for drivers and pedestrians, the need for a wider culture shift amongst road users while parking was also raised.

In terms of follow up we will continue to work with TfL, Flo Eshalomi AM, Helen Hayes MP, and the local community to try and make the crossing safer for everyone.

Our South Circular safety campaign

Earlier this year, one of our local residents, Jaz, was tragically killed crossing Thurlow Park Road on the zebra crossing at the bottom of Birkbeck Hill. This is not the first accident on the South Circular, but we want to work with Transport for London and local residents to make it the last.

This crossing is particularly dangerous – vehicles speed from the lights by the gyratory, the road narrows from two lanes to one, and the crossing is obscured by the hill and the railway bridge.

Together with local residents, we would like to find a way to improve safety at this dangerous crossing and across the South Circular, so hopefully further loss of life can be avoided.

Please join us, Jaz’s friends and neighbours, local residents and parents, TfL officers and our local Assembly Member Flo Eshalomi on 21st March for a walkabout to show the problems of the unsafe crossing and speeding on the South Circular, and then a meeting to discuss potential solutions and campaigns.

Everyone is welcome – you can let us know you’re attending here southcircularwalkabout.eventbrite.co.uk

It’s Night Tube time!

The first Night Tube services begin TONIGHT! Running on the Central and Victoria lines from tonight, the service will be extended to the Jubilee, Northern and Piccadilly lines in Autumn. It will offer a 24-hour service on Friday and Saturday nights.This means that tonight trains will run every 10 mins to and from Brixton, with the 37, N2 and N3 bringing residents back to Thurlow Park through the night from Brixton station. There will be an enhanced police service during overnight services to ensure that the Tube remains a safe, low crime environment.

After the delays to the rollout of night time services, we are thrilled that Sadiq Khan has managed to come to a resolution with staff and unions that everyone is happy with and deliver the new service within just first 100 days of office.

Space for Cycling

We have been very pleased to see so many Thurlow Park residents writing to us about improving cycle safety and welcome the excellent work that the London Cycling Campaign has done in helping to coordinate some of the priorities of cyclists across Lambeth. The Labour Council have compiled a complete list of those priorities by ward across the borough, which we would be happy to share. As soon as we have more information about your proposal to make routes to Turney and Rosendale schools safer we will update you.

In the meantime, the Labour Council is working hard to make the borough as cycle friendly as possible. We are pleased to be the third most popular borough for cyclists in London and it is a Labour manifesto commitment to make Lambeth the most cycling friendly borough in London. Some steps we taking in this direction include;

Labour are committed to making a record investment in our road and pavement network. In the next 4 years alone Lambeth are going to repave 130 miles of highways and footpaths to help eliminate potholes and other obstacles that pose a threat to cyclists.

We are working with neighbouring Southwark to introduce a borough-wide 20MPH zone.

In Thurlow Park, many of you signed our petition last summer calling for greater safety measures around the Tulse Hill Gyratory. We managed to secure a £5 million investment to redesign the junction to make safer and more cycle friendly.

Under Labour, Lambeth were the first borough in the UK to introduce secure, covered cycle hangars on streets and estates for residents without spaces to store their cycles and we are looking to expand this provision.

In Thurlow Park we are working on improving road safety in and around the Rosendale School area to allow everyone to cycle safely, including better traffic monitoring and the potential addition of a cycle path.

Robson Road junction proposals

Cllr Ann Kingsbury wrote to the Head of Transportation at Lambeth Council to express her strong support for the views of the Norwood Forum and Norwood Action Group in response to traffic plans of the Norwood Road /Robson Road junction.

As you may well be aware, there has been extensive consultation on the junction and there seems to be widespread approval for Lambeth’s proposals – which also include a pedestrian crossing and better design for cyclists.

From the pedestrian point of view the introduction of staggered crossings is not an improvement in either safety or amenity, as its quiet possible that people will be tempted to cross the road in a straight line and will take risks in doing so.

The current Lambeth proposals should result in improved safety, but it would appear that the TfL modifications give pedestrians and cyclists safety and amenity a lower priority. It also appears that these modifications could lead to a loss of road space and force cyclists to compete for access.

In any case, banning a left turn at the junction with Robson Road will presumably force traffic to turn into Ernest Avenue or Hannen Road to join the northbound traffic on Knight’s Hill and then right into Robson Road. This will effectively create a new gyratory system and introduce the possibility of the junction being blocked by the 322 bus turning right. The plans do not seem to allow for a permitted left turn for buses, an it is difficult to see how this will improve journey times for passengers on the 322 in the Crystal Palace direction.

Furthermore, the route along Robson Road, turning left at West Norwood is the only direct route between West Norwood and West Dulwich. Although only a small proportion of West Norwood traffic takes this route, the amount is still sufficient. If redirected down other left turns off the Norwood Road an increase in traffic would be to the detriment to the centre.