DJKillaQueen

SIGH.....hire cars are used to transport principle actors to guarantee they arrive, and arrive in comfort and on time (if hire cars and drivers were not used they would have to use their own vehicles). Ordinary cabs are not used. Specialist car companies and drivers are used. Technicians, crew and other cast (not priciple) use their own vehicles, and yes some use motorbikes but not everyone is capable of riding a motorbike (nor wants too in cold, wind and rain)...........there are no holes to pick in this guys...really.......

But there already is an arts scene in Peckham Louisa. It's attended by local people and many of those creating the art are local working class people too. At the same time, some of the out of town artists that have come to the area have run free childrens art workshops at our tenants hall for example, so I'd argue their input into the local working class community is something to be welcomed as well. It's such inverse snobbery to criticise regeneration because it's not working class enough. Just be thankful that anyone has a vision to do something to bring underused areas back into popular use. Margate had been in decline for decades. It's coming back to life precisely because of regeneration, which includes contributions from the arts world, amongst other things. You only have to look at the programmes of Bold Tendancies to see they support a wide range of arts from all sections of the community, irregardless of class, age, culture etc. Not only does that mean that the appeal is to all sections of the community, but it also means that any member of the community who wants to make a film, write a play, create some art, dance, sculpture etc has an outlet to show that work. And for a lot of working class people, that's a valuable asset.

I think it's a great idea. The car park is underused as a car park anyway. Has been for years, with people using the free parking in Morrisons instead. The Copeland Industrial estate has been a hub for artists and arts for years now, so there's already an established arts circuit with an established audience in Rye Lane anyway. The recent production of Macbeth was a sell out for example and I support anything that makes theatre and art affordable and accessible. So it has my thumbs up.

And no one has said they did. Cars are sent to collect them instead.

No problem. It's all good :)

You are not silly. We might not agree on this issue but I wouldn't belittle you or your job or your intellect because of that. I do many things with my free time and a lot of it is voluntary work for my local community, so I do my bit for a better world. And maybe it is because I see poverty and inequality as more impotant issues than transport that I don't place the same importance on an issue you are clearly passionate about.

Smart phones are great for filling time while waiting for rain to stop. Doesn't really take that long to write and send a post....well not me anyway.....it might be different for you LadyD ;)

The council have mobile camera equipment to measure traffic 24 flow e-dealer and I've seen that in use - usually at juntions to collect data for calculating light phasing needs, but speed data is not collected that way and certainly not 24 hours a day. The only devices that operate 24 hours are designed to catch speeding motorists and they need to be painted yellow by law. But by all means, link us to the automated 24 hr hard data collected by the council if you think otherwise. More on traffic count data in a nice pdf here https://www.southwark.gov.uk/downloads/download/3056/transport_data And an excel sheet for average speed counts accross the borough over recent years, which shows a an awful lot of average speeds that are within the set limits for those roads.

Err I drive up and down it so many times a week I can tell you I never get above 15mpr ......or is an onboard speedometer not as good as DB stood at the pavement claiming cars go 'too fast'......? And I don't see any experts I'm afraid.....just civilian viewpoints, some based on hard evidence, others not.

The world isn't even going to change.....the limit is proposed for between Whateley Road and Grove Vale and will make absolutely no difference whatsoever.

The limit is PROPOSED for between Whateley Road and Grove Vale. A stretch that rarely gets above 15mpr anyway. Will make absolutely no difference whatsoever.

It's a proposal for only part of Lordship Lane (Grove Vale end).....a part that rarely gets above 15mpr during the day anyway, and will make absolutely no difference whatsoever.

No they do......... All drama is shot either in studios and on location. I thought I'd made that very clear from just the example above. Willard has backed that up too, because he works in the same profession. During my apprenticeship, not all placements were in drama. Some were post production placements in Soho for example, so I could cycle. But apprenticeships send you somewhere for anything from a week to a month, not the 3 to 12 months that a full job does. So it's possible to do an apprenticeship and only ever be placed at the point that productions are 'in town'. That isn't the case once you become a freelancer in the profession, where you are employed on a production from start to finish. Even in other genres like sports or documentary, technicians again are sent all over the place, sometimes changing locations several times a day. They need to get between those locations as quickly and easily as possible. Again public transport isn't the best option. Time is money in production. Of the twelve hours each day you have all those crew and cast etc shooting you need them to shoot as much as possible. Not have time wasted on trains and buses that take forever to get anywhere. I really don't have to explain this any more. I know my own profession and what people need to work in it. There are far softer targets to challenge anyway...like the school run for example.

James just for once can you stop saying 'probably' to embellish your argument and just stick to facts. You have no way of knowing what cars were doing before or after the reading. The statement clearly says AVERAGE SPEED 24.8 and 26.1 both of which are WITHIN the speed limit. That a small minority might get one or two percent above the limit does not equate to a speeding problem. It just means a minority of drivers don't keep within the limit, which happens everywhere. And the simple way to catch those, is with speed cameras. Where I do agree with LD is that our transport systems/ roads are not working as well as they should or could. We may not agree on the solutions or the shape of priority but there's enough evidence to point to problems in the future just getting anywhere. On that I can agree.

But everyone doesn't own a car LD and many people never will. And a lot of former car owners have abandoned cars because of the cost vs use. London will always have problems because of it's size and density, and most major cities have pressures during peak hours. Outside of that though the roads move ok. I work in drama/ features (and I guess Willard too), not current affairs so not really the right area to raise awareness. And yes....I don't know a single person who works on location in the film industry or TV drama that doesn't own a car, or motorbike. It's essential. Production will often provide transport for specific crew members to use as well. Actors are always collected by private hire cars. Even one essential technician or actor being late, can cost a production thousands. It can't happen. It sounds brutal I know but that's how it is. Post production is a little more flexible because a lot of editing facilites are located in soho and around White City, but editors and their assistants are often based at one of the big studios during the shoot and again, public transport isn't good enough. There was one (huge) production I worked on where I had no vehicle for two weeks. To get to this out of use airfield (on which the set was built) in the middle of nowhere, and be on set at 7am meant I had to leave at 4am. Cycle to Herne Hill Station. Take a variety of trains towards St. Albans. And then cycle 15 miles up and down hills from the station at the other end to get to the set on this airfield. I would get home, after doing the same journey in reverse, at 10pm. You do the maths on how much sleep I got. I was 29 then and those two weeks destroyed me. There is no way that now at the age of 45 I could do that journey. Driving time though was 1 hr and 30 minutes each way - so a huge difference. Film people are also usually travelling just before and just after peak hour too (unless doing a night shoot). Indeed during my two year apprenticeship, the better placements (on the bigger productions) went to those apprentices with their own transport, because not having transport severely limited which productions you could work on. It's just one example of why some working people have to commute by road. This issue is not black and white. Uncleglen's point about time being taken away from family time is also a good one. Long working hours are bad enough for family life. I can also understand why people drive to give them more time with their children.

I have some sympathy for that view uncleglen - especially when it comes to vanity vehicles and plastic bags and packaging. Even electric cars...much lauded as the solution, require energy to be used elsewhere to generate the electricity and the impact on the global environment is negative. Electricity is a more wasteful way to power vehicles than fuel because of the way in which electricity decays en route anyway, so it's not the answer. Environmental issues are such a minefield and I too have been left feeling there isn't any real will by anyone (companies, governments and individuals en mass) to do anything that will really make a difference. The other thing that bugs me too is that if I need to say go to Liverpool suddenly, that a Train ticket costs three times what the petrol costs to go there and back. I prefer to use the train for those journeys and can get cheap tickets up to a week in advance. But not on the day or night before. That does frustrate me.

I disagree...commuting DOES count. No-one in my profession can work without a vehicle. You have to be on set on time every day.....no excuses. And some locations have no train or bus links.....really they don't. Outside of those professions or circumstances where a vehicle is necessary, I don't know anyone who drives to work. I do know many people with poor mobilty for whom a vehicle is their only way of getting about. I think you are a bit rich to call anyone selfish because they use a mode of tranport you don't approve of LD. And to do so just because you don't have need of it is definitely a selfish view. Common sense should tell you that cycling is not possible for every journey or for everyone. Just as common sense should tell you that the vast majority of drivers do NOT have accidents or endanger peoples lives every time they go for a drive.

Worse still I'm having to agree with the e-dealer............ :D

There are places not accessible...I've worked at some of them. Try working in the film industry LD...you'll change your mind on that one (some locations are very remote). You try cycling to Shepparton studios six days a week as well....to work a 12 hour day. Or how about Pinewood? Try it by public tranport and tell me if you would be happy with a four hour journey on top of a 12 hour working day six days a week (the journey takes an hour by motorcycle and costs far less). Because that's the kind of thing you are not considering. So vans are ok then? And many self employed people do use cars instead of vans. I know lots of people that do. And where is your evidence that most people own cars for convenience? It's an assumption you make to fit in with your eccentric views. Last time I looked, trains and buses are so overcrowded during peak hour that the system would collapse if every vehicle user switched to them anyway.

'There is no need for individual car ownership in London unless you are disabled.' Or work in a trade or are self employed in a service sector (or have to transport equipment as part of your job), have to work nights or long hours, work 20 miles outside of London where there is no transport link. It's such a daft comment to make. I can think of many reasons why people need to own a vehicle who live in London. You think everyone works in an office at the end of a tube or bus route, no more than an hour away, obviously.

'DJKQ, you just argue about everything for the sake of arguing' No I don't. I only post on the threads you pop up on ;) You just never agree with me, that's all :D

I take your point on right to buy and tenant replacement, but I'd still argue that there are 2.5 million homes that were formerly owned by the council that no longer aren't and that a high proportion of them are not occupied by the tenant that bought the property either. It's hard to know if right to buy had never happened, if those tenants would still be there (so not freeing up any properties anyway) or if tenants would have bought in the private sector instead (again increasingly unlikely as those property prices soared). It's definitely a point worth considering though, so you have got me rethinking that one a little.

I've always said LM that investment in things like small businesses and anything that gets people working for themselves and in turn creating jobs has to be part of any plan to reform anything. And I've yet to see any government in my living memory do anything significant in this respect. All I've seen is 30 years of a shrinking economy and the decimation of any kind of industry. So I completely agree with you. The irony is that homes have been demolished in my home town of Liverpool because so many people left the city (two thirds of them over the last 30 years) to find work. Again I laugh at governments suggesting people move to find jobs because we've all been doing that for decades. They really do not have any clue of life outside the South East. I think at the time, right to buy seemed like a great idea, but over time I think it's not been a successful one. It's a bit like the sub-prime market in the US. You are trying to sell a lifestyle to people who can't really afford it, and have no comfort zone if circumstances change or things go wrong. Another crucial social change though is the loss of Jobs for life. That was a central factor in enabling lower income families to buy their homes. Job insecurity and employment by fixed period contract has also pushed up the cost to the welfare state. For me it shows a basic lack of understanding by those that dream up these things of how difficult upward social mobility is for those at the lower end of it all.

There are no in-between steps really. For the first 12 years of right to buy, councils were not allowed by law to reinvest the money from the sale of homes in house building or buying of new stock. So none were built. Secondly the demand for affordable housing has not decreased with the sale of social housing for the following reasons. Traditionally, people moved from social housing when they could afford to buy a home in the private market. But that was when house prices were still within the realms of average salaries. My parents for example did that. They were only allowed to borrow 2.5 times my fathers income and they bought a run down terraced house. My dad was a bus driver. Today a bus driver borrowing 2.5 times his annual salary could not afford to buy anything....let alone a three bedroomed house anywhere. So for that reason there is an increased demand for social housing. In the 80's two things happened. Deregulation of mortgage lending restrictions and cheap credit which led to a housing boom in the private sector and the sell off of social housing at discounts to get lower waged families on the property ladder. The result 30 years on (in simple terms) are house prices that are no longer in the range of most average salaries (house price inflation) and a growing need for affordable housing with a shrinking level of affordable housing available, including council owned property. And when first time buyers dry up, the government and banks just create another scheme, like part by pert rent, buy to let and now grants for first time buyers....anything to keep the prices going up and up. We've had three recessions in as many decades, and the housing market has been barely touched by any of them. I use the Dickensian analogy for good reason. At present we have real issues with over crowding in small properties, especially council properties where entire families are housed in small flats. There are no affordable houses for them to rent. The kind of property I'm taking about has two teenagers sharing bunkbeds in one a room not big enough to house a wardrobe too. And this is something the government now demands. These small dwellings have real issues with condensation. Often low waged tenants can not afford to heat them daily which exacerbates the problem and it's not uncommon to find mould and mildew covering whole areas of walls and ceilings. Mould IS a serious health issue. How do children also find the space they need to study, or do homework in those kinds of conditions too? The conditions people live in has a huge impact on many things. Damp, cold, mouldy and overcrowded living spaces are not unlike anything in Dickens time. Almost one million people in full time work need housing benefit to pay some of their rent. Again this was unheard of 30 years ago. Governments, instead of recognising that it's the unaffordability of hosuing that creates the squeeze, instead choose restricting benefits in some lame attempt to squeeze landlords into reducing their rents. But many landlords can't reduce their rents because they are still paying mortgages on those properties and in reality, what has happened is that landlords have decided to no longer rent to the low waged or unemployed...which in turn increases demand for affordable housing. It's a complex issue...brought about by many things. The solutions are not quick, cheap or easy either but it can't continue as it is.

Because tenants are given anything up to ?100k off the market value. Imagine if you owned a home worth ?200k but were only allowed to sell it for ?100k. Discounts can be up to 70% of the market value. Labour reduced the discounts, the coalition have made them bigger than ever. Also when Thatcher's government first introduced this policy, councils weren't allowed to spend any of the money from the sales at all on house building (Labour changed that). It was an out and out attempt to reduce social housing. Over the past thirty years around two and a half million homes have been lost to the private market through right to buy, and worse still, a third of those sold homes are now in the hands of private landlords. The son of one former Tory Housing Minister owns 40 ex local authority homes alone. There are around five million people nationwide on social housing waiting lists. There's no doubting that the right to by scheme has been a disaster for affordable housing in the UK (but that was the point). It's worth also adding that the bigger and better homes (especially houses) were amongst the first to go. That too is why there is a shortage of council owned family sized homes. So we now have the crazy situation where councils are paying out to house homeless families in properties they once owned at four times the rent they charge the tenants living in properties they still own. Meanwhile we have a government who in spite of knowing all this are reducing what they will pay to house the low waged and unemployed and disabled. The result is a return to overcrowding and poor sanitation and increased costs to local authorities in trying to manage it all. A few days ago Stephanie Bottrill walked under a lorry on the M6 because 'she couldn't afford to live'. The welfare reforms had just been too much for her. The bedroom tax was the tipping point. We should all be ashamed that is happening in our country, from a government that wasn't even elected with the majority mandate of the people. Cameron et al did not earn or win the right to govern in anything but a hung parliament. We need more affordable housing, and fast. That's number one. And number two, we need the bedroom tax abolished, or at least waived if a local authority doesn't have suitable accomodation to rehouse someone. There needs also be a grace period of adjustment, so that only those who genuinely have no desire to adjust, by turning down reasonable offers of alternative accomodation, are punished. Driving people out of their homes of 18 years and longer without any sensitivity or proper alternative is just nasty.