legalalien

Many petitions going on at present so am posting the link to the general petitions page. http://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgEPetitionListDisplay.aspx - ending the DV and MG north and nearby experimental road closures - stopping experimental prohibition on no right turn from Peckham Rye West onto EDR (I think this is the proposal temporarily paused) - permanent pedestrianisation of Rye Lane On the other hand: - reopening of Rye Lane to buses - school street at St John?s and St Clements ETA: and now a new petition to open Rye Lane generally http://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgEPetitionDisplay.aspx?id=500000061

I managed to make an order on the opening day, and very much enjoyed my dinner! You can pre-order earlier in the day, before the opening time.

I don?t know but oddly enough I was planning to walk up there in the next couple of days. Will make sure I do!

Article in today's Times about a pilot scheme where drivers who scrap their cars receive a "transport credit" in return. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/drivers-to-receive-3-000-credit-for-taking-their-cars-off-the-road-zzzwpj6gb?shareToken=0493214e28adc0456941779825c2147c

Just came across these shortish videos, showing views from high points in the area, and enjoyed them so thought I'd share. Apologies if they've been posted before!

"MPs should allow local government to get on with it, and concentrate on the big picture." Is part of the problem that Councils are also taking it upon themselves to concentrate on the "big picture" rather than focus on the wants and needs of their constituents, and the "populism" you describe is a reaction to that i.e. people expect local councillors to listen to and represent their views in a way that they understand MPs generally cannot - and this expectation is not being met? From what I've seen, some of the councillors in Southwark (i) don't seem to be doing a great job of listening/representing; and/or (ii) might be doing so, but are effectively being whipped/ told to toe the party line; or (iii) because they are so focused on the big picture, are engaging more with policy bodies/ lobby groups than they are with their own residents. And frankly, when you have the cabinet member for housing trolling a local residents' association under a pseudonym (and then, when he is removed from his position, other councillors going on twitter straight away to say what a great guy he is), it doesn't give a very favourable impression. MPs also represent their constituents and I applaud those who are prepared to step in and say something when they feel that local government is not working for them, particularly when they are challenging those in their own party (who else is going to stand up for residents if something is going wrong?). In fact I think all democratically elected politicians should put genuine representation of constituents above loyalty to any cause, party political or otherwise. Perhaps I am a bit populist at heart.

Interesting that you mention Underhill, Raeburn. I was reading about the Southwark Cycling / Will Norman meeting last March that someone had posted on Twitter- the map from his slide deck shows that area of East Dulwich as being some sort of ?liveable neighbourhood? ie up for traffic calming or road closures etc. But I?m not sure I?ve seen anything from Southwark about proposals / the idea of that? https://southwarkcyclists.org.uk/the-dr-will-norman-talk/ Am I reading the map correctly?

Funny you should mention gentrification, as the more council things you read or watch the more this comes up as an issue. I was reflecting yesterday on the contrast between the council?s proposals to take away community green space to put more houses on the Priory Court Estate (the one involved in the recent Cabinet member Twitter scandal), and its enthusiasm to create more community space in a wealthy area already well-endowed with parks, sports fields and gardens. Perhaps some infill housing on ?Dulwich Square? might be appropriate if the closure stays in? I doubt that has crossed anyone?s mind.

I personally have no problem at all with through commuters but I seem to recall it was one of the key arguments being used to drive the original OHS plans. Happy to be wrong.

Interesting that Cllr Rose concludes that because many of the addresses of those ticketed are outside Dulwich, it?s being used as a commuter through route. Surely some of these will be eg tradespeople working in Dulwich, delivery drivers, people working locally but living out of area (eg teachers at local schools), people working at local shops, people going to medical appointments - all kinds of things without being ?through? commuters? I hope we?re not going back to the narrative that all the traffic locally is traffic that shouldn?t / has no need to be there.

Did anyone catch Ella?s mum and Little Ninja on TalkRadio last night (think they were discussing LTNs and the Simon Still/ LCC Twitter thing? I missed it. Can?t seem to find it online, just wondered how it went.

Maybe we could just classify posters into tribes, D&D alignment style, rather than try and find potential duplicate accounts? There is a bigger issue here about local democracy and the relationship between councillors and constituents, the role of political parties in local government, the amount of whipping that goes on, whether councillors' loyalty / focus is with their ward constituents, their LA political party organisation or their national party organisation. Voters expect them to represent constituency interests, and with the way the system works this is perhaps naive? Is there a "councillor culture" that doesn't sit well with the formal rules, that happens because every other councillor is acting in a similar manner, so it all seems OK?

I would agree with a ban, at least in cities for those with alternative heating - there was an article in the Times about this a couple of days ago - https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/wood-burning-stoves-are-biggest-source-of-dangerous-air-pollution-in-cities-dxqxbtk8n. Most people in cities using wood burners are well off and have an alternative.

I think you?re right Slartib - the same small group of people keep republishing the same small pieces of selective data under different names to make it seem like new and more objective info. The two contacts on the document are Active Travel Academy (at UoW, director Rachel Aldred), and a freelance campaigner who has worked for SusTrans and Waltham Forest Council, writing a piece about Rachel?s LTN research, how good Waltham Forest is - and including Rachel?s colleague?s frankly risible Dulwich snapshot cycle count to give the headline that cycling has doubled in Dulwich (we?ve discussed the flaws in that already). The DfT data, which we now know is hotly disputed by TfL, remains a centrepiece... What we need is some independent local monitoring and to see traffic modelling for the Dulwich LTNs and critically all the relevant boundary roads.

"it's clear that the effects depend on local conditions. If indeed the schemes have led to increased traffic then they are not successful. That's what we need to know more about. " And I would add also not successful if they result in essentially the same amount of traffic distributed in a much more uneven way. People understand that it will take a while to get the monitoring data, and that the data being collected recently is not representative of a normal, non COVID situation, but knowing exactly what is being monitored and what success and failure look like would be a really good start. I appreciate this is probably out of your control.

Southwark are currently carrying out a consultation on licensing of private sector rentals, this may be of interest to any private landlords or tenants locally as it includes (asI understand it) a proposal to roll out "selective licensing" of rentals to/by single family groups or two sharers, initially to the Champion Hill and Goose Green wards among others ( with future plans for most other wards inc. Dulwich Hill and Dulwich Wood, subject to govt approval). Essentially a landlord renting to just one family would need to be licensed and comply with various conditions. There are already schemes in place covering rentals to larger numbers of unrelated people. The website says that they are keen to hear from landlords and, in paricular, tenants. More generally, the accompanying report is an interesting / eyeopening read about the levels and state of private rental properties in the various Southwark wards. https://consultations.southwark.gov.uk/environment-leisure/2021-private-rented-sector-property-licensing-prop/ https://consultations.southwark.gov.uk/environment-leisure/2021-private-rented-sector-property-licensing-prop/supporting_documents/210209%20Information%20for%20consultation%20on%20licensing%20V2.2%20Final.pdf

Alice - this is a good question, as lots of reports to cabinet / committees etc refer to something along the lines of " usual council channels". Which I think means the hard copy of Southwark Life (which is supposed to go to everyone, although historically I'm not sure the delivery process has been perfect); email communication to anyone who has signed up online or previously been involved with the council in a relevant way and found themselves on a distribution list, council facebook pages (whose activity varies between wards), and being in a group that councillors see fit to engage with. I'm not sure it works as well as it could - info is not pushed out as widely as it could be: on the other hand, those who are proactive in finding out info can't be criticised for that. I've been trying to contribute by posting stuff on here, but that's not a comprehensive audience, obvs. Interesting discussion to be had on how this could happen better.

Or it could be that more people in these wards are aware of funding opportunities and make proposals?

I think you could ask the relevant councillors, who will presumably be looking at the underlying proposals. If I had to guess, I'd say East Dulwich Square will be at the melbourne Grove / grove lane junction. Ie an element of pedestrianisation there?

Nigello - I'm guessing it doesn't really make sense for the Council to do that, until such time as the relevant orders are made permanent - as there's a risk that the expenditure could be wasted. (Or to look at it another way, spending the money now makes the whole "experiment" appear to be a fait accompli, and could open the decision-maker up to challenges of pre-determination /bias when the final decision on whether to make the closures permanent is made.)

I would add my recommendation to those above - Billy came to service our boiler yesterday and was friendly, efficient, and managed to ring around and find some replacement parts which were needed. I have booked in for next year's service!

Here's the agenda for next week's South Multiward forum meeting. http://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?MId=6871 It will be - announcing funding decisions on the list of applications for Cleaner, Greener, Safer funding (list of applicants attached to agenda) - about ?250k in total. A few cycle parking things that people might be interested in - announcing funding decisions on the list of applications for the Neighbourhoods Fund, I think ?10k per councillor. List of applicants also attached, including a ?3k application from Friends of Dulwich Square for a minimusic festival on the square, the aims of which are " To bring the local community together, support local businesses and showcase local musicians & artists. The closure of the junction in Dulwich Village has been controversial and has caused divisions with some in our community. The concept of a mini music festival on the newly formed public space is to demonstrate the positive potential of this new community space that was once a dangerous and polluting road junction. We hope to encourage footfall to help support the local businesses in Dulwich Village." Lastly, approving the allocation of "Devolved Highways Funding" for particular highways projects suggested by the local community(As I understand it, local councillors hold the purse strings on this funding pot). Here's the link to the list.http://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/documents/s93813/Appendix%201.pdf. No entirely clear to me whether they all get funded (about ?140k available) Anyone know /want to guess what the following are: East Dulwich Square Dulwich Village Cycle Roundabout ( something to do with the Burbage Roundabout, or will it go around "Dulwich Square"?) "Measures to complement the Streetspace programme". College Road and Huntsslip road safer routes masterplan (its the word masterplan that makes this sound sinister!) More seriously, worth taking a look, as seems to give an indication of things that are being proposed by the community / considered. Various road calming and cycle parking measures, the proposal for traffic lights/ ped crossing at LL/EDG junction, a proposal for less pollution on EDG. You can't see the details, but if anyone feels strongly about any of them (for or against), may be worth emailing the relevant councillors to share views in advance of the meeting/decision.

As noted above, I find conducting the argument at the macro level unhelpful - I'd love it if people could stop generalising and focus on each scheme on its merits. Tbh I suspect the Dulwich scheme is a bit of an outlier - it's very large, in an area with poor public transport and few east- west routes, and described from the outset as "complex". I'm not sure what the consequences for this sort of devolved approach would be on the big picture (are they all flawed? Do some make sense?) because I've only looked at the LTNs near me. When discussing generally I extrapolate from what I see locally, which is probably wrong, and people in different LTNs seeing different things and with opposing views probably do the same thing. I read the DfT external consultants'report about previous studies on modal shift etc, referred to in the Times this morning. Was going to post the Times link, but refrained because (i) felt that they were slightly cherry picking and (ii) having read the underlying report there is lots of room for everyone else to as well - the main thing I took away from it was that there really isn't any / enough hard data about what works to generalise even on a city basis, let alone anything concrete enough to add usefully to a discussion of the LTNs in Dulwich. End of the day, I just want the council to comply with statutory requirements, monitor and get as much hard evidence as they can, and be as transparent and accountable as possible in a timely fashion (and if they do that genuinely and it means an outcome I wouldn't choose , then I'll give loser's consent); our local councillors to operate with an open mind and comply with their obligation to represent constituents whose views don't accord with their own as well as those whose views do; a system of local government where councillors have more independence and less whipping. And maybe a world where people could acknowledge the flaws in their own arguments and recognise the need for nuance (that's not directed any anyone / any side of the argument in particular). On which note I'll continue to stay off Twitter! ETA: sorry about the earworm 😉

I know very little about this, but the Council are about to embark on a flood alleviation scheme for Peckham common - details here - https://www.southwark.gov.uk/environment/flood-risk-management/notice-of-proposed-flood-alleviation-works-on-peckham-rye-common. If you click on the link to the project information board you?ll see they?ve done a hydrological survey, and there?s some modelling of once in a lifetime storm events. Maybe this being published is affecting premiums? But then if the scheme is effected there should be a consequent reduction of risk?

Hard to tell without seeing the underlying Q and A. For example, "no such schemes were implemented without the relevant trust?s knowledge" is different from saying that the statutory obligation to consult the trust was discharged - they could eg have been emailed the day before and informed of the closure. For the Dulwich ones, the specific FoI requests already made show the LAS view. I remain of the view that we need to stop generalising about LTNs and consider each on its merits (although some of the process flaws involving DfT /TfL are generic and it makes sense to comment on those generally). Not all LTNs are necessarily bad just as they are not universally good...