LTN Discussion

[legalalien]

I guess a consultation not being a referendum can cut both ways.

[first mate]

2 hours ago, legalalien said:

I guess a consultation not being a referendum can cut both ways.

Indeed and it is council indifference to majority opinion and experience that ought to be of concern to many of us. I agree with you LA that this/ our council is so desperate to increase revenue that it may have overstepped its legal powers in choosing punishment of car ownership as the mechanism by which to make up financial shortfall. 

[ab29]

Just walking from Forest Hill station, along South Circular / LL: traffic stationary and not moving at all - the usual and so much worst since so-called ltn was introduced in Dulwich. I wonder what cllr leeming have to say - you live on a main road so you die ten years earlier because of air pollution? How is southwark council proposing to address this?

[legalalien]

Actually I’m not 100% convinced that Southwark are doing this as a revenue raising exercise - perhaps that’s naive of me. If they are, it’s going to be likely to be difficult to prove, as I doubt they’ve documented that intent anywhere. If raising lots of revenue is an unintended/ ancillary consequence of a policy that they’ve put in place for proper purposes then I guess they’d be on the right side of the law.

The question I’m asking myself is whether Southwark would be entitled to impose an outright ban on large swathes of on street parking for the purposes of nudging people out of car use / to help reach net zero/ air quality goals. Related question - if the council cares that much about those policy aims then why doesn’t it ban on street parking rather than charging for it?

For anyone interested, central govt guidance on council parking enforcement is at

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/civil-enforcement-of-parking-contraventions/guidance-for-local-authorities-on-enforcing-parking-restrictions

To be fair to the council there are some objectives that are a bit broader than those in the RTR Act:

“Enforcement authorities should design their parking policies with particular regard to:

• managing the traffic network to ensure expeditious movement of traffic, (including pedestrians and cyclists), as required under section 16 of the TMA, Network Management Duty
• improving road safety
• improving the local environment
• improving the quality and accessibility of public transport
• meeting the needs of people with disabilities, some of whom will be unable to use public transport and depend entirely on the use of a car
• managing and reconciling the competing demands for kerb space”

Later on, councils are directed to take account of the following when regularly appraising their parking policies:

“The appraisal should take account of:

• existing and predicted levels of demand for parking
• the availability and pricing of on- and off-street parking places
• the impact on the local economy and the viability of local shops and high streets
• the justification for, and accuracy of, existing traffic orders
• the adequacy, accuracy and quality of traffic signing and road markings which restrict or permit parking
• the level of enforcement necessary for compliance
• the levels of penalty charges
• the need to resource the operation effectively and ensure that all parking staff are appropriately trained
• impact on traffic flow – for example, traffic or congestion outcomes.”

There’s also a statement that . “Motorists and other road users need to be aware that parking enforcement is about supporting wider transport objectives, in particular keeping traffic moving, rather than raising revenue.”

Against the overall scheme of the Act I still think it’s a struggle to justify a borough-wide CPZ on the basis of the statutory objectives, even given the couple of bullet points about the local environment/ managing competing demands for kerb space in the guidance (which was updated in 2022 and I’d hazard a guess those words were added quite recently).

Just more idle pondering.

And in the “learn something new every day” category- apparently there’s statutory guidance about petitions to challenge parking related TMOs once they have been implemented. One to remember for the future - although I doubt a petition would get anyone anywhere. 
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/right-to-challenge-parking-policies

[Nigello]

One of the planters on Derwent near to the main road junction has been moved and damaged. The road is no longer blocked. 

[teddyboy23]

Not dulwich but tower hamlets council have decided to remove many ltn from their roads,but keeping the ones where schools are sited.due to  the devide between local shop keepers and residents

Edited September 23, 2023 by teddyboy23

[legalalien]

I see in this morning’s Guardian article that 

“Councils in England have since been instructed by the DfT to return lengthy questionnaires by the end of September on any LTNs they have installed since 2020, including the consultation process used before they were built.”

I wonder what the DfT plans to do with that info (apart from send it out to loads of people in response to the inevitable FoI requests)?

 

[heartblock]

I would be interested to read Southwark’s return, especially in light of the complete lack of any monitoring of pollution levels, traffic and air quality on boundary roads of ED and Dulwich LTNs,  for more than a year. 

[ianr]

On 23/09/2023 at 03:58, legalalien said:

Against the overall scheme of the Act I still think it’s a struggle to justify a borough-wide CPZ on the basis of the statutory objectives, even given the couple of bullet points about the local environment/ managing competing demands for kerb space in the guidance (which was updated in 2022 and I’d hazard a guess those words were added quite recently).

The earliest update returned by  https://web.archive.org/, that of 22 June 2020, has just the same six points.  The one before that was in 2015.

 

[Rockets]

9 hours ago, legalalien said:

I see in this morning’s Guardian article that 

“Councils in England have since been instructed by the DfT to return lengthy questionnaires by the end of September on any LTNs they have installed since 2020, including the consultation process used before they were built.”

I wonder what the DfT plans to do with that info (apart from send it out to loads of people in response to the inevitable FoI requests)?

 

It's starting - if I was a councillor and the council I would probably start donning hard hats because there's probably incoming heading their way....both from the Tories and Labour HQ

[first mate]

It will be interesting to see the contortions they resort to.

Everyone should try to make a point of watching the monthly Scrutiny sessions on Southwark's YouTube channel. They are really most interesting and to a degree the place where Cabinet Members must report on policy and process.

[legalalien]

Good advice FM, I used to try and keep up but have fallen out of the habit. Just logged in to watch tonight’s meeting - watching a very impassioned speech by an estate resident about Southwark’s failures in relation to its housing estate. Really interesting.

edited to add - this has turned out to be incendiary. Although the council have admitted getting everything wrong with this housing project the guy from the tenants association is making a lot of allegations about the council covering up fire safety info.  Everyone in the meeting looks shocked.

Edited October 4, 2023 by legalalien

[first mate]

My word, have looked at some of that scrutiny session on housing and there is a stench of possible fraud/corruption. What also stands out is the extent to which residents trying to raise very real and valid issues with the council say they have been deliberately and systematically blocked, misled and even lied to by officers and contractors, over ten years!

Even council members seems to imply something very awry in that department but I was also struck by the emphasis on mismanagement of information/data, poor/non-existent consultation, appalling communication.

[Rockets]

Is this linked to the Cllr Leo Pollak scandal?

[legalalien]

54 minutes ago, Rockets said:

Is this linked to the Cllr Leo Pollak scandal?

No suggestion of that. Seems the council’s housing lead departed recently, as one of the other senior execs was at the meeting doing the apologising notwithstanding he’d only been covering the post for about a week. I think he usually covers the child/ education portfolios. Anyway is not relevant to this thread so I guess continue any discussion in the lounge ☺️

[CPR Dave]

Do you have a link to that scrutiny session video please? I can't see it on the usual YouTube channel.

Many thanks.

Edited October 6, 2023 by CPR Dave

[legalalien]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aI_RBnQ4pvk

[Rockets]

Oh my goodness - that is horrific and absolutely shocking - no wonder none of the council leadership joined the meeting. There are so many parallels (pasted below) to the problems highlighted in that video that many have accused the council's LTN programme suffering from - makes you wonder if the problems are systemic:

• Lack of accountability
• A systemic failure by the council
• Leaning more on consultants and outside parties because the council officers don't know what they are doing and want the cover of consultants for someone to blame if it goes wrong
• Running tick-box consultation exercises (often after the decision has already been made)
• Council decisions putting lives at risk
• The council not learning from previous issues (the same thing in this case was happening 10 years ago apparently and has just been repeated)
• The council lying to residents
• Where is the money going, why is everything costing so much money?
• The council blocking the sharing of information and transparency because "they know the house of cards could come tumbling down"
• The council is losing things when people leave the council (they lost the lessons-learned document from the previous time these issues came to light)
• The council's own KPIs that told them 99% of residents affected were "satisfied" - the councillor said the information was clearly "rubbish" and challenged the committee to determine where it was coming from and how it ended up in the council report
• Council officers leaving the council to get out before the house of cards come tumbling down
• The dire need to rebuild the relationship with residents
• Why should anyone trust the council

It seems this only came to light because one of the residents who lives in one of the blocks is a planning officer and could see what what going on and knew something wasn't right - my goodness me. Everyone in that meeting acknowledged that things had been going wrong.

[Dogkennelhillbilly]

On 20/05/2023 at 08:43, first mate said:

Moreover, there are moves to now ban cycling from large sections of the Dutch city, as bicycles too are deemed a nuisance and safety issue. Is this what you envisage here?

Loving the suggestion that London could shortly get overwhelmed by cycle traffic and that banning bikes will be the only sensible solution. 🤣🤣🤣

Let's cross that bridge of wild success and overachievement when we come to it, eh?

[Rockets]

No chance of that in London...cycling down again in London in the latest annual DFT stats...not quite at pre-Covid levels (like it is nationally) but getting closer each year.

Edited October 6, 2023 by Rockets

[first mate]

13 hours ago, Dogkennelhillbilly said:

Loving the suggestion that London could shortly get overwhelmed by cycle traffic and that banning bikes will be the only sensible solution. 🤣🤣🤣

Let's cross that bridge of wild success and overachievement when we come to it, eh?

This was from a discussion way back in May, many, many pages back. It was to do with reports there were moves to ban bikes (including e-bikes) from the centre of Amsterdam, as they were making life too difficult/dangerous for pedestrians.

I don't know if Rockets' information on cycling going down also includes e-bike and scooter use? I do think usage probably tends to go down as summer and the good weather ends, but happy to be corrected.

As an aside, Cllr McAsh indicated at the Scrutiny session that he supports e-bikes but is not so keen on scooters.

Edited October 7, 2023 by first mate

[Rockets]

I will share the data when I have time but it is from the DFT annual National Travel survey.

 

[heartblock]

Does this scrutiny committee and the disgraceful behaviour of having policy imposed on residents without consultation have anything to do with LTNs being imposed, does using external consultants and them having more power over decisions than residents as outlined in the first 20-30 minutes of this meeting have anything to do with badly planned LTNs?

I would think yes. 

It does require another thread, but this whole debacle is a disgrace and echos the mismanagement of traffic and pollution control in ED.

[first mate]

I believe the Housing dept has a particularly bad rep and there is even mention of possible fraud/corruption by one resident representative. However, the MO does seem very familiar, in the broadest terms: flawed data, blocking resident scrutiny, mismanaging information or misleading, misuse of consultation process, misrepresentation of consultation process,  or no consultation process at all.
 

The impression is that the Cabinet Member and even the Leader had over the years been dismissive of resident concerns and objections, fobbing them off at every turn.

 

[Peckham Park]

Article in Southwark News about the LTN https://southwarknews.co.uk/area/dulwich/disabled-dulwich-village-pensioners-say-ltn-has-spoiled-their-lives/