Tessmo

@curmudgeon An independent safety study of the junction the way it is now is in existence. It questions the sharp turn from Townley to EDG. But the study hasn't yet been released by Southwark. There is still a delay on linking the lights to all the other junctions, and in adding the cycle features. It will probably be November before all this happens. As @Zebedee Tring says, it's sad that Southwark didn't listen to concerns about the sharp turn from Townley to EDG before they built it. It's also not ideal to have the junction lights and cycle features only half-finished for three months.

@bawdy-nan If you give Calton Avenue the priority, I'm pretty sure cars will behave will less consideration. At the moment, because Court Lane has the priority, people have to slow right down and, as you say, indicate, be very cautious and use eye contact. That's exactly how we want cars to behave at this difficult and congested junction. Yes, it can be improved. Definitely should be improved, I agree, for both cyclists and pedestrians. But it feels to me as if TfL engineers haven't given the complexity much thought. Will giving Calton Avenue the priority make it better or worse as a Quietway for less confident cyclists? How does it all link with Townley Road and the tailbacks and congestion that already exist on Calton Avenue?

@rch Here are the four TfL draft designs for the junction of Court Lane and Dulwich Village http://turneyandburbage.org.uk/2015/09/24/dulwich-village-junction-possible-redesigns-photos-of-drawings-for-discussion/ Southwark didn't want to circulate the draft designs more widely, so a resident took pictures on a mobile phone. Basically, they all give priority to Calton Avenue, and two of them make Court Lane one-way. (As far as I know, we weren't told how far up Court Lane the proposal for one-way traffic extends. Also, there had been no modelling as to where traffic would go e.g. up minor residential roads? on to Woodwarde Road?) There also seems to have been no attempt to link this junction to congestion or capacity at other junctions, particularly....Townley Road. There's discussion about all this on the Quietway thread, too.

Hello, Richard Tudor. The second Sustrans workshop on Saturday was a general introductory one again - the same as the first one - and people were invited to put symbols on maps to show where they'd like pedestrian crossings, etc. The four TfL designs for the junction of Court Lane/Dulwich Village were presented again - all giving priority to Calton Avenue, and two making Court Lane one way. It was stressed that these TfL designs were only the first stage, to help discussion - but how four designs that were essentially the same was supposed to help discussion I'm not sure. The 'concept design workshop' which looks at everything people have said so far, and tries to narrow down the options, is this Saturday 3 October from 1pm to 3pm at St Barnabas CHURCH (not parish hall) in Calton Avenue, SE21 7DG. As far as I'm aware, you can still turn up and object to the whole process if you want to. As someone at Saturday's meeting said, the Court Lane/Dulwich Village junction is key. If, for example, Calton Avenue is given the priority, so it becomes a much more attractive short cut for cars, fiddling about with pedestrian crossings is all a waste of time.

Next on the agenda, because of the recent Quietway consultation (improving the cycling route down Calton Avenue and Turney Road), is changing the junction at Court Lane/Dulwich Village. So far, Tfl has presented four vague designs to the Sustrans workshops, all of which make Calton Avenue busier. (Which is what you want for a Quietway, obviously.) No attempt has been made to link this junction with Townley Road in terms of capacity or congestion, as if cars arrive out of the air, like flies, rather than trailing through residential streets to get there. Wouldn't it be lovely if someone bothered to do some joined-up thinking?

Questions are being asked about who saw the plans for the latest 'interim' junction i.e. the unfinished one in operation now, and whether the detail of it was approved by all the official bodies who look at safety.

@wulfhound Big changes can happen. But not by imposing solutions on a community without any discussion. I think even Southwark can see that now. Most people (including me) agree there has to be a reduction in car use. Most people (including me) are in favour of initiatives to encourage cycling and improve cycle routes. Hand in hand with this, TfL should also be improving public transport - especially in this part of London, which has a low rating for public transport provision. The Dulwich area has a specific problem with children living too far away from some of the schools to walk or cycle, which is why there are such huge peaks of traffic congestion in the morning and evening in term time, and why local streets are almost empty of traffic in the school holidays. No one knows yet whether the Townley Road junction will get the planned special cycling features, as they're currently being trialled elsewhere in the borough. We understand that was TfL's decision, not Southwark's, and it seems to have been made pretty late in the day. The phasing of the lights is not complete either. So it's hard to know at this stage whether ?250k has been put to good use i.e. whether it will improve safety for cyclists and pedestrians. But what is fairly obvious is that the unfinished design is definitely not safer for cyclists. With cars stranded in the middle of the junction backing up over pedestrian crossings, it's not safer for pedestrians either. It's hard to see how the massive build-out on the corner of Townley Road and East Dulwich Grove will ever be a good feature, as large vehicles turning left from Townley Road are swinging out into the area where cyclists are waiting on East Dulwich Grove outside JAGS. You can blame this all on the local community for objecting to Southwark's first design preference if you like. Or you can wonder why a successful outcome for ?250K is quite so hard to achieve.

General plea to anyone who might be able to go down to the junction for half an hour 8am to 8.30am, or 3pm to 3.30pm, to take pictures of near misses between coaches, cars, cyclists and pedestrians. Add date and time, and where you were standing. Important for Southwark to see what's going on before there's a serious accident.

Thanks @rch. This has been going on so long, I've lost my sense of humour...

@Abe_froeman Please, please tell me you're joking...

@Zebedee Tring Yes, there are difficulties for coaches - and even cars - turning left into EDG. I have observed several vehicles running over the ASL (Advanced Stop Line), where cyclists are waiting, as the vehicles turn from Townley into East Dulwich Grove. This was brought up as a question to Southwark Council officer Matt Hill at the Dulwich Community Council on Wednesday night. He confirmed that it would be looked into if it was a problem. At the moment - although this might be sorted out once the lights are properly linked to other junctions and the right-turn filter is working properly - there is also a clash between, on the one hand, vehicles and cycles turning right from East Dulwich Grove into Townley Road (they are stranded in the middle of the junction as their lights go red), and, on the other hand, vehicles turning left, or right, or going straight on, as the lights go green in Townley Road. I saw a right-turning car on East Dulwich Grove that had stopped in the middle of the junction preventing a left-turning coach (which was blocking the coach behind it) from Townley Road from completing the turn. The car, realising it was blocking traffic, then reversed up, right over the pedestrian crossing which was showing a green man. Fortunately, no children were crossing at the time.

Talk to Doug the lollipop man about whether he thinks the junction is safer for children.

@intexasatthemoment Matt Hill didn't say what the barrier would consist of. On the plan attached to the traffic management order, it's described as "Proposed 10.5m x 0.6m cycle lane segregation island to be installed, offset 1.5m from the adjacent proposed kerbline". I don't know if that's still the plan.

@intexasatthemoment At last night's Dulwich Community Council, Matt Hill, the Council officer, confirmed that the cycle lane currently painted on Townley Road with a dotted line will become a mandatory cycle lane with a solid line and a barrier separating it from the main flow of traffic once the Traffic Management Order has been signed off by the Cabinet member. The advance lights for cyclists in that lane, and the gate, will probably be added in stages after they have been trialled by TfL elsewhere. He said the delays were caused by a difference of opinion between TfL and the Department for Transport.

If Council officer Matt Hill is going to answer questions at the Dulwich Community Council meeting this Wednesday 9 September (agenda below), I think we should all try to go to see if we can make sense of what he says. http://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=176&MId=5157&Ver=4 The cycle features on the plan approved by councillors in March are nowhere to be seen. Some may be added later. Some won't be. Is what's there now safe for cyclists? The Traffic Management Order talks about a mandatory cycle lane, which is definitely not there at the moment. Shouldn't a TMO apply to what's there rather than what was on the plan or might be there in the future? Have safety audits been done on what's actually been built?

I am confused. The cycling features are so different from the plans. From what Southwark says, some features can be added later. But it doesn't sound as though TfL will allow a separate cycle lane with a barrier. That's a huge change from any of the drawings. Is it OK for plans to go through like this? i.e. to get approval from the Dulwich Community Council (elected councillors) for one design, and then go ahead and build something completely different?

Just to say thank you @penguin68 @qwe @sb. Let's move this forward.

Which bits are subject to the traffic management orders? Still confused about this. Only the yellow lines and cycle lanes? That left turn from Townley looks exactly the same to me.

@rch, is there anyone who can explain what you've flagged up, please? I had no idea the Secretary of State used to approve streetworks. It looks as if the legislation you've mentioned came into force on 6 April this year. As far as we know, the second design for Townley, which was the subject of the re-consultation exercise, was still only in draft form when the cabinet member approved the decision. Was that a strange thing to have done, then? Have we ended up with the Council, through the cabinet member responsible, approving an unfinished scheme - which means that the final scheme on page 16 of the traffic order has been approved by no one at all, except for the council officers who thought it up?

@rch Thank you for trying to save the poor tree. No traffic orders went through until the one @Woodwarde flagged up. From what we can gather, you only need to conduct statutory consultation on permanent traffic orders for very few elements of the scheme, like cycle lanes and yellow lines. That's not the impression we were all given at the March DCC. We thought the total scheme, including the final layout, would go through the statutory consultation phase. But apparently not. It's great, isn't it? The clear, transparent way that Southwark Council conducts consultations?

@intexasatthemoment I think that's the point, isn't it? Southwark doesn't want us to know anything. Until it's too late.

Thank you, @Woodwarde, for posting the Southwark notice about Townley Road. But where is the plan? Page 16 of this (Townley Road at East Dulwich Grove) seems to be what we need https://www.southwark.gov.uk/downloads/download/2558/traffic_orders Hard to read without expertise. Like posting something up in a language no one knows. Anyone with any expertise out there? What have we got here? Does the diagonal crossing work for the elderly and mums-with-buggies for example? A great example of statutory consultation.

Who knows whether anything can be added to the junction design, James. No one will let us see it...

No, it isn't OK. We were told right from the beginning that there would be a formal statutory consultation on the whole scheme. There were design changes made to the scheme in March that no one has even seen. They haven't been made public. Who knows what the final design looks like? The junction is being changed to make everything safer for cyclists and pedestrians. But the final detail of what the cycle lanes look like won't be made public and formally consulted on until work has already started. That's not transparent or democratic or good practice.

522 signatures on change.org petition: https://www.change.org/p/the-dulwich-estate-sg-smith-child-safety-before-profit Significant protest for a local planning application.