Penguin68

Ah, yes, carrying a blazing torch through Lewishan and even Peckham - I'd thought we'd rather exhausted the possibilities of that this summer.

I cannot recall either the Lib Dems or Labour campaigning locally at the last election for an ED wide introduction of CPZs - yet it is clear from the actions of the Labour controlled council, and of James Barber in his incohate support of this scheme that this is a clear and certain political agenda. The smokescreen of 'constituents asked for it' is clearly disengenuous - James and the council know that once the wedge is in in the first zone planned, the pain suffered by the ever expanding circle of adjacent streets, a pain caused by the movement of people outwards, and (more) the reduction of avalable parking, will cause the next set of nimbyists and the next to vote for what most never wanted in the first place. What annoys me most is not the secret and hidden agenda now becoming overt, but the plaintiff cries of Mr Barber that he is not being politcially motivated - which is, in itself, an entirely legitimate thing for a politician to be, but not when he pretends this is all even handed and what the consituents asked for and he is just a servant of the people. He has a number of times claimed that the CPZ WILL allevate parking problems in the first zone to be designated - even that is an unfounded claim with little evidence to back it, considering the redcution in available space that it will entail. If Mr Barber would only admit that he believes in CPZs becuase he dislikes cars in towns and likes to see ED people pay towards the rest of Southwark's road related issues that would be something - but his constant theme that he is only doing it for the best of reasons to help his constituents is just so much rubbish - unless he believes that he only represents the few people living in the first CPZ triangle. In which case, in future, perhaps only those grateful souls should consider voting for him.

amd it hasn't answered why talktalk is so poor in ED at the moment? I can't answer that, I have nothing (now) to do with any carriers, other than myself being a customer - however I had written what I did as a response to discussion about TalkTalk's use of BT (actually Openreach, as an arm's length subsidiary of BT) landlines. What I was trying to make clear was that the landlines are only one part of the complexity, and a shared landline supplier might well not lead to a shared broadband experience. If the problem is with talkTalk it might be either a technical problem on their local equipment in BT exchanges, or possibly problems of contention (too many customers for the kit they have installed). It is also possible that they have made software changes to their system but these have not been properly picked up by local modems/ routers. It may also be that you have made software changes to your system which have created incompatibilities. I recall a few years ago that when iTunes was updated in one release it created a software problem in some routers - that took a lot of time to identify and sort out.

It may help to understand a bit about the way that line based broadband is offered. Broadband (line based) has only two underlying local carriers, NTL/ Virgin (cable company) who have a monopoly provision of (mainly) coax connections and who are not obliged to share their lines with competitors and Openreach, the Wholesale arm of BT Group, who provide copper pair to most households. BT Group is obliged to let competitors use this copper network (on a wholesale basis). Most competitive broadband carriers using BT infrastructure now operate Local Loop Unbundling (LLU). Openreach provides and maintains the local network for its customers ? BT retail arms and those competing with BT retail arms, such as TalkTalk. Openreach is obliged to treat its various customers in an even-handed manner. Openreach also provides fibre network ?to the cabinet? (copper beyond) and is trialling fibre to the premises. These two form the backbone to e.g. the BT Infinity offer. Openreach network terminates on exchange equipment which is provided by BT or by its competitors, which can put its racks into BT premises. It is from these racks that ?intelligent? services ? such as broadband via ADSL and its variants is delivered. Problems with broadband which are local loop based will include signal attenuation (when the copper loop to the exchange equipment travels a long distance) and signal interruption ? when the pairs which may go through a number of flexibility points become interrupted (disconnected). Sometimes copper pairs may also be cross connected accidently. Attenuation will tend to be a permanent feature (setting a maximum speed possible), interruption may well mean an entire loss of signal. Most problems with broadband transmission occur in the providers? equipment and network (i.e. beyond the Openreach remit) or in customers? equipment, particularly modems/ routers in customers? premises. Sometimes problems in intermittent speeds will be caused by contention, when a lot of customers are trying to use a limited amount of e.g. bandwidth on connecting cables. Contention can't happen within the (openreach provided) local network (everyone has their own twisted pair back to the exchange - there is an exception if pair-gain kit is being used, but that's very unusual in the London network as it should only be used where there's overhead distribution - most of ED is underground). You can get contention within cable company local provision. This means that customers may well have very different broadband experiences based on their own equipment or their providers? ? with the Openreach network frequently quite neutral. Unfortunately with 3 players (retail providers of broadband, wholesale provider of network and your own equipment (which may include your own computers) identifying and tracing faults and improving quality can be quite complex (and each player would prefer to see the problem in another?s area). [NB mobile carriers also offer broadband access wirelessly - in many cases their cell sites will be connected into their own controlling network via BT supplied cables - indeed BT may provide and run this network for them].

This is from the Met's own website on Trident http://www.met.police.uk/scd/specialist_units/trident_trafalgar.htm What we do SCD8 Trident Terms of Reference * MURDER - Trident investigates all murders by shooting involving a lethal barrelled weapon or a weapon that has been converted to be such a lethal barrelled weapon, where both the victim(s) and suspect(s) are from black communities. * SHOOTINGS - (i) Trident investigates all non-fatal shootings or discharges involving a lethal barrelled weapon or a weapon that has been converted to be such a lethal barrelled weapon, and (ii) Any threat to police officers and other police staff, for example PCSOs, where a firearm is produced but not discharged. * PRO-ACTIVE OPERATOINS - Trident targets those who possess, supply, convert, reactivate and manufacture illegal firearms and those who seek to use illegal firearms to prevent shootings occurring. From this it would appear that Trident does look at all shootings, but also specifically all black-on-black (suspected) shooting murders. Elsewhere the link quotes Trident Operational Command Unit (OCU) is the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) response to gun related activity occurring within London?s communities, but at this time only gun related murders within the black community. The levels of violence associated with this type of criminality are extreme, with the use of firearms becoming more prevalent

Seeing as the new blue bins have more than double the capacity of the old boxes The blue boxes (together with similar volume blue bags for papers) were collected weekly - we are now using double the space (slightly less taking account of papers) for half as many collections.

Here's a scenario:- A street is (quite) parked up. Some of the people who park in the street use their cars for work - they go off, come back in the evening - creating spaces. Commuters (normally betweeen, say, 7:00 and 8:30), arrive. They park in available spaces. Residents are either already parked-up and have gone to work by public transport - so aren't effected, or are still in their houses and haven't driven off, yet. Residents drive off - at any time after 8:30 their space is unlikely to be taken by an onward commuter, who have already parked up and gone. So if they then 'lose' their space it is likely lost to someone coming in to the area to either work or spend money in the shops. They may also lose their space to those choosing to travel into town out of commuting hours, so, not really commuters. I suspect that true onward commuters are not displacing that many residents - who either are themselves commuting or won't have left home by the time the commuters want their spaces. Of course, school run parents may be caught out by this - but then school run parents are encouraged not to school run.

Sadly modern boilers have a 10-15 year life, or less; it is the old fashioned, simple to build and maintain non condensing boilers that have a 20+ life. If all the boilers were installed much at the same time they may well all be failing much at the same time. One of the additional problems is that rules about where boilers can be sited have now changed, so often you cannot replace a boiler in a like-for-like situation any longer - this may also be causing problems in replacing them. They should need only annual checking - nowadays they are often not 'serviced' - but interfered with only if their emissions go above a certain level (which is a good diagnostic for a problem which 'servicing' - mainly cleaning the flue etc. - can address). Peterstorm's suggestion about economic repair issues also sounds sensible - indeed, if they are all failing similarly it may be that the part which is failing is no longer available, or too costly too replace. Unfortunately it is at the onset of winter when problems with boilers often emerge, as they switch over from just water heating to space heating as well - just the time you don't want them to fail, of course, particularly if you are elderly. It is a good thing this has been a very mild (indeed balmy) autumn so far.

I get my windows cleaned back and front (not 3rd story) for ?25 (semi) - might not be completely unreasonable depending on size/ number of windows. Key issue is to pay only after the event, never up-front.

I have been driving round ED all this morning, constantly getting caught behind binmen themselves caught behind the multiplicity of road works happening all over, plus building works with skips and goodness knows what other obstructions - if I had to work my way round ED with all that happening as part of my job (with annoyed motorists angry to get caught behind rubbish trucks behind roadworks sounding off as well - not me, this time) I too might be a bit short tempered, particularly as my work routines for 4-5 years (sometimes many more) have all been disrupted. My 'standard' rubbish men have been coming on Fridays for the past 20 years, now its Tuesdays. Nobody likes change.

The really, really stupid thing about this is the name - drive anywhere around Dulwich at the moment - it is alive with the brilliant autumn colours - leaves, berries - we are at our most colourful - but the aparatchiks think a colour thief has been about apparently. A festival in midwinter in the snow, perhaps, but in autumn?! No idea!

This cpz plan is meant to make roads safer It claims this, it also claims to make trees in the streets grow better as well, and no doubt birds sing more sweetly, lambs gamble more actively and all things nice happen everywhere at once. Or, to put it another way, car owners will be punished for their presumption and the council coffers will swell, so that more lunatic anti-car schemes can be pushed through. Why, the new table by the school in Grove Vale could be raised another foot, some cars are still getting through unscathed.

The penny drops

All of this is leading me to think that the residents of Derwent Grove should be trying to negotiate with those neighbours, who don't use their cars during the week, to get them to park further away. Bad idea, I believe. I had a car vandalised on Saturday night (near-side wing mirror ripped off - i.e. the wing mirror that 'faced' the pavement -so no drive-by accident) - I knew it immediately and could do something about it. If your car is parked streets away you either have to visit it regularly (which is a bit of a bother) or risk it being vandalised etc. for days before you notice. In my experience once the first bit of vandalism sets in, the car is quickly a burnt-out wreck if you don't take action swiftly. So I certainly wouldn't chose to park my car long-term well out of sight so a neighbour could get quick access to theirs. Even to save ?125 a year.

It's not a five car family, in reality, it's a two car family with 3 other adults who in times gone by wouldn't have been living at home, because they could have afforded to live somewhere else. That's the point I am making - previously adults wouldn't all be living together - the adult children would have long flown the nest. I could afford to live away from home in my very early twenties, in rented accommodation, by 25 I was buying my first flat. In London. Those days have long gone - so where there are family homes, like ED, they are now being lived in by more adults (even if all in one family). If you like there are 4 family units (what would have been family units) living in one tenement. Girl friends and boyfriends who would be living together are now having to live with their parents, they need the cars to get to see each other and go out and lead their own lives. And you are right, it is the choices people have made about their need for personal transport in SE London, particularly at weekends when public transport is frequently interrupted, which have brought parking pressure locally. The commuters are an excuse, even though the pressure and reported problems are real. It's actually the moral equivalent of blaming immigrants because there are no jobs or housing - and I feel some of the same xenophobia creeping into some of the 'pro' posts at times - even though figures even quoted by James don't really support this.

Surely it's kitchen/ garden waste every week and non-recyclable rubbish one week, recyclable waste the next. So, it's the brown bin every week, and EITHER Green OR Blue taken with it, on a fortnightly rotation. What you describe, Huggers, (brown and green bin taken) seems right, unless you've had two weeks running brown and green. I would assume that this coming week you'd have brown and blue taken, and the green ignored.

I have not understood from the documentation circulated whether the whole new proposed CPZ is to be treated as a unitary whole (permit holders may park anywhere within the CPZ) or, as I suspect, that it will be further zoned, as described by others, including me, above. If zoning is planned (by far the most luctrative option - and therefore surely the one which will be chosen) then the possible inconvenience level to CPZ residents will be substantially escalated, particularly for those relatively central (i.e. not in periphery roads next to non-CPZ roads). Put simply, if the number of 'legitimate' (permit allocated) cars in any road is more than the allocated permit spaces (which the high car ownership per tenement, particularly for multiple occupancy houses is likely to mean) then, permit or no, you may not be able to park at all close to your house. As the housing crisis worsens (with houses not affordable for the young) then the number of adult children, with cars, living still with parents will increase - putting additional pressure on parking. I know of at least one house in the area (there may well be many more) with 5 adults in one family living in one house, all with cars. This trend will only increase. Only one of the adults living there uses their car for work purposes (and he works from home a couple of days a week). The others use public transport/ bikes during the working day - meaning that they have 4 and sometimes 5 cars parked up locally. The overall Southwark 'cars per household' figures mentioned by James are irrelevant in the specific ED situation.

Schools, restraurants etc work perfectly well in other parts of Southwark with 8.30am-6.30pm mon-fri controlled parking. My point, James, is that the case being made (emotionally) is about onwards commuters - and yet the parking survey would not be able to distinguish between those and people who have driven in to add value locally, by working in schools etc. I might want to exclude (actually I don't, but for argument's sake I might) a banker using ED Station as a quick hop into town, but I wouldn't want to exclude a hard pressed primary teacher who is educating the local children. But both are 'commuters' under the rules being promulagated (non residents parking locally during hours of work). Oh and who is this 'we' who only wants more non-car visitors? If I have a shop I want people to buy lots, not what they can get into a shopping bag on a bus, if I have a restaurant or a bar I want a group of people to arrive (with designated driver) because they are sociable and spend more. You may want more non-car visitors, but then you (very evidently) want a CPZ. There are many people (I am certainly one) who look on cars as a boon and a ticket to personal freedom. I use public transport im London, but not because I enjoy it.

This is sounding less and less like an ED forum and more and more like the Royston Vasey Forum - 'local roads for local people...' Let us not forget there are 2 types of commuters - those who park in ED in order to catch public transport and continue their journey, AND those who come in to work here - in the two schools adjacent to the proposed CPZ, in the shops and restaurants - all adding value to our community - well, until they can find a job in an area more friendly to incomers anyway. Maybe it's local jobs for local people as well. Did the apparatchiks who did the parking survey discriminate between onward commuters and people who come here to work and serve - well, I doubt it. James wrote in response to a suggestion of mine to increase parking that it would: just encourage more car use along our roads and make East Dulwich station a destination for far more people to drive to. This from the man who only 18 months or so ago, if memory serves, was asking how we might attract more people to visit ED to improve its economy (one of the endless Waitrose debates as I recall). Obviously making it easier to park here would (a) do this but (b) not to his liking.

promise a lot and deliver little No, you are quite wrong there - they deliver a lot of revenue to councils, particularly where they can tax unmercifully for infringements - favourite trick - suspending bays with cars hitherto legitimately in them and then clamping/ towing the cars - ?250 to get them back. They use (actually I believe wicked) private contractors to do this therebye washing their hands of the grief.

The council's solution to a parking problem is to reduce the amount of space to park in and to charge people to use it where previously it was free. The broad equivalant of paving over fields in a famine and charging extra for water to water the few fields left. Good business but a bad societal attitude. If there isn't enough parking, create more - there's a perfectly good old hospital site which isn't being used for anying and on which you could park cars - you could park lots of cars if you built a multi-story there. But meeting a parking problem by creating more places to park - well obviously that's a stupid answer, isn't it? Not when there's money to be made and control to be exercised.

Maybe people should be fined Oh great - another revenue stream for the council - great ploy - force everyone to have more bins than they have space for, then fine them. Some of us need the big bins (my blue bin was overflowing by the time it was collected (and that was on time)) - I have the space off street, but many people don't. Maybe the councillors who had this pig stupid idea should be fined for every eyesore bin left out there - but fine the victims, not the criminals, that's they way to do it.

the wishes of people near the station who say they're suffering parking problems James - the evidence suggests that only a small percentage of cars parked in these roads (10%, 14%?) are 'commuter' (in the sense that they might be cars of people who then use ED station to complete their journey. Some will be 'commuters' who work locally (like the people who teach at the school - good idea to keep that sort of scum out) - but most of the problem (probably - given the evidence of people who find it difficult to find spaces in the evening) is that we now have more cars than space to park them in where we live. Offer people in the CPZ streets a 'this could solve your problems' message and of course they will vote yes - but that, frankly, is a lie. A CPZ will reduce parking space availability in any given street (i.e. there will be less space to park in) and will not solve (unless permits are rationed to one a household) the over-car-ed problem (which is a 'good' problem as it reflects affluence and better life-styles). Unless you would prefer your constituents not to have a better life style or to be affluent?

Ah, another nice little earner then... maybe the Coalition hasn't done any favours by freezing council tax, it looks like the ED CPZ-ers will be picking up all the slack. Hey ho. It's the Arthur Daley school of local government - but then, isn't it always? (but without the charm, of course).

They sometimes call these platforms 'tables' - this one is more like a tallboy.