FOI responses or research on braking and turning around LTNs and School Streets

[Rockets]

You mean when Aldred referred to them as innovative when she was awarded the funding to research them....impartially? See the announcement below and her quote.

 

https://www.westminster.ac.uk/news/university-of-westminster-to-lead-major-ps15m-new-study-on-low-traffic-neighbourhoods-in-london

[Rockets]

13 hours ago, ianr said:

I don't think posting it again has any value.

But you can clearly see which poster is being removed so did that answer your question? And it is all very premeditated as she stops on the first attempt because someone comes in the shop and disturbs her. Not the actions of someone who can claim any impartiality after that and she tarnished every piece of work her name is associated with on LTNs as a result.

[malumbu]

@Rockets You really are scraping the barrel if you think there is a smoking gun here:

"It is exciting to be able to study these innovative but under-researched interventions in much more depth than has previously been possible. For instance, we will extend our previous research by examining not just impacts on overall levels of walking and cycling, but also any changes in who walks and cycles, for instance gender balance. This award also means that we can look in detail at local people’s experiences, and how these experiences may change over time. Another focus will be examining changes over time in congestion levels on boundary roads and in the experiences of residents living on boundary roads, areas where more research is needed.”

As someone with so much lived experience of LTNs you would be much better off engaging with Westminster University rather than posting the same things again and again here.

Let's put it to others, a like if you would like Rockets to engage with the academics and sad face if you don't agree and confused emoji if you want an end to this thread (see next post, 3-0 to ending the thread) .  If we get more than a couple bothering to read these posts I'd be surprised.

Edited Saturday at 15:35 by malumbu
Edited to take into account Richard Tudor's sensible post

[richard tudor]

how about thumbs up to closing this post down. getting very boring listening to the say peoples view over and over again.

[Penguin68]

On 19/02/2026 at 12:00, malumbu said:

This smearing the academics because you don't like the results is tiresome and desperate.

I write as someone who has both taught and assessed academic research. One of the 'bias' problems with research, and it particularly reflects social research, is what is called 'confirmation bias'  - 'A cognitive bias where researchers consciously or unconsciously focus on data that supports their hypothesis while ignoring contradictory evidence.'. Ms Aldred is a committed activist and it would be incredibly difficult to avoid such bias in any work she designed and undertook, even unconsciously, which makes her as a primary source of research evidence a very poor choice. This does not mean that her findings could not additionally be presented to help decision making, but it would be understood to come from a particular viewpoint. It is, in my view, inappropriate for her to be chosen as the primary research vehicle for an issue which sits directly with an area where she is an activist.

If you wanted to undertake an assessment of the impact of the current Labour Government, you wouldn't turn to Starmer as your key source, or to Boris as your source for the impact of the Tory Government on the Covid pandemic. And if you want to look at the impact of LTNs or similar traffic measures, looking for an active travel enthusiast as your key researcher is equally concerning, however 'good' her research skills might otherwise be. The failure actually doesn't lie with Aldred (she is who she is) but on those who commissioned her, who I suspect knew exactly what sort of result they would get. For them, again I suspect, confirmation bias wasn't an issue.

Edited Saturday at 16:48 by Penguin68

[malumbu]

@Penguin68What you are suggesting by inference is that the organisation funding the research wants a certain result so goes to a friendly party in order to get that result.

Research doesn't work that way.  Organisations submit proposals which will then go through an appraisal process,  The contract will be monitored internally and externally.  You know all of this.  Sunak wanted the research his government funded to come out with a views that LTNs were bad.  But instead it was very much a mixed bag and he tried to supress this.

Would you not agree with me that those who feel most strongly about this with their own personal experience would be better off corresponding with the academics rather than going on, on this site, which is unlikely to change a thing?

And would you not agree with me that the part of the study "Another focus will be examining changes over time in congestion levels on boundary roads and in the experiences of residents living on boundary roads, areas where more research is needed" is most welcome.

I've worked in research, managed research and even commissioned some social research in the past.  Bit rusty now but I will still defend the independence of academics, rather than sling mud, as one or two do here.

This is not the 1950s and the suppression of research on smoking and lung cancer, or the 60s onwards when the fossil fuel industry successfully lobbied against research showing the impact of rising carbon dioxide levels on climate, even getting their tame researchers to come up with alternative conclusions.  Although drill baby drill over the pond, and Nige on this side, seem to be moving us back to the dark ages in terms of knowledge.

[Penguin68]

1 hour ago, malumbu said:

Research doesn't work that way. 

How naive. And, by the way, organisations don't initially submit proposals, in this type of instance, they respond to a brief proposed by the commissioning organisation. You are confusing this with academic research where academics submit proposals looking for funding. In this instance funding was already available for a proposal which met the brief. And the commissioners you can be pretty clear, knew the answer they were looking for. 

[Rockets]

4 hours ago, malumbu said:

Penguin68What you are suggesting by inference is that the organisation funding the research wants a certain result so goes to a friendly party in order to get that result.

Hallelujah! The penny finally drops! 

3 hours ago, Penguin68 said:

You are confusing this with academic research where academics submit proposals looking for funding. In this instance funding was already available for a proposal which met the brief.

And this very much part of the game...get a Dr. of something to do it and the masses will believe it is impartial.

The drugs and FMCG industries had a big problem with this in the 2000s....many of them commissioned research from "rent a result" Dr's from Russia who would tell you what you wanted to hear for the right price.

 

 

[Earl Aelfheah]

Hilarious that people refusing to condemn an obviously misleading / dishonest 'summary' on this thread, and who have repeatedly cherry picked information and disregarded whole datasets, are then criticising peer reviewed academic research as prone to confirmation bias. Irony is dead.

Edited 8 hours ago by Earl Aelfheah

[malumbu]

On 22/02/2026 at 13:57, Penguin68 said:

How naive. And, by the way, organisations don't initially submit proposals, in this type of instance, they respond to a brief proposed by the commissioning organisation. You are confusing this with academic research where academics submit proposals looking for funding. In this instance funding was already available for a proposal which met the brief. And the commissioners you can be pretty clear, knew the answer they were looking for. 

Rude.

In my understanding in central government,  market and social research, as with all research, has to show good value for the public purse through the procurement and project management process.  From my understanding this goes through the Research Marketplace Dynamic Purchasing System. 

From AI: Research Marketplace Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS, RM6126) offers high value for money by providing access to a broad, constantly updated pool of pre-qualified social and market research suppliers. It drives competition through mandatory mini-competitions, reducing procurement time and costs while facilitating access to innovative, specialized, and SME suppliers.

And similarly from AI: Under the Procurement Act 2023, which came into force in February 2025, authorities are required to consider broader social, economic, and environmental benefits, often termed social value. 

With your better knowledge than me, is this correct?  

It's twenty five years since I was involved in social research, and from an even earlier time I was involved in some niche stuff that involved consumers that certainly went out to a competitive tender process using BRMB working with academics.  Maybe we can discuss over a beer sometime - my niche area is something that I expect has never been of interest to EDF.  (although interestingly relevant the other well known EDF).

So let's talk about the research that Sunak funded in the "end the war on motorists", where he commissioned IPSOS to come out with the answer that LTNs don't work and should be scrapped.  How on earth did he choose a market research organisation that managed to get this wrong.  Could he have gone to the Russian's as Rockets suggested from earlier 'dodgy' research to get the right answer?  Anyway irrespective of the data on congestion, air quality and crime, which ho doubt some of you will say was biased, the survey work that IPSOS carried out showed that it was far from black and white, and a significant number of residents actually welcomed these schemes.

Sunak delayed publication but it had to come out sooner of later.  It didn't save him and the interim guidance to local authorities was ditched under Starmer.  

Sadly, whether on purpose or by accident, your posts gave some a stick to beat me with.  I'll address that separately with respect to the unsubtle jibe made on another thread.

Meanwhile worth a good read, I've yet to fully digest it.  

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65f400adfa18510011011787/low-traffic-neighbourhoods-research-report.pdf

Exacting from that: 

Ipsos designed a survey to gather the insights of residents already living within existing LTN schemes.
This involved sampling 12,723 addresses within four LTN scheme areas:
• Birmingham: Lozells Places for People
• London: Arlington Road Camden
• Wigan: Worsley Mesnes
• York: Navigation Road
A total of 1,852 residents aged 16+ completed a survey during October-December 2023 using a ‘push-
to-web’ methodology. An invitation to take part in an online survey was mailed to addresses, followed by
a reminder mailing which included a postal survey as well as repeating the invitation to take part online.
This generated an unadjusted response rate of 15%15 although response varied considerably by area,
shown in Table 4.1

@Penguin68 is this methodology suitably objective is it designed to give a pro LTN outcome?

The penultimate page of the report gives the Ipsos assurance process

I've put in a deliberate mistake in my post above as a test.

 

  

 

Edited 36 minutes ago by malumbu