Rockets

The thread is only embarrassing for the council, councillors and those who blindly support them in their active-travel/LTN quest. It is yet another proof point that what some of us have been saying about the way the council and councillors have been abusing the process may well be true.

To be fair @Earl Aelfheah you don't seem to be that keen to discuss the content, just argue about which AI summary is more accurate. I don't know about anyone else but when I look at the documents within the FOI then @Lebanums AI summary seems far more balanced than yours. The fact you have the gall to post something to suggest that it demonstrates "numerous governance strengths" when a key excerpt is email traffic suggesting the council avoids it's own internal governance process is beyond laughable. You are making yourself look a little bit myopic over this - there is no defence for the way the council has behaved over this. The FOI materials are beyond damning - one person even withdraws from the process due to the approach being taken - no doubt to protect their own reputation and, possibly, career.

@Earl Aelfheah come on....you are not going to able to distract people from the content within the FOI. This is just desperate now. It's absolutely damning. You know it. Everyone knows it. You're desperately trying to distract away from the smoking gun left by the council and the way you refuse to acknowledge the content is the most telling, and concerning, part of this.

This is really bad for Southwark Labour. It is an utter disgrace. Some of them are abusing the powers given to them with the office they hold.

Was there any indication on the What's App group why the council was in such a rush to get this rolled out? Which councillors were leading the charge to get it deployed?

@Earl Aelfheah but what about the content of the emails.......which your LLM conveniently omitted....;-)

Spot on. I would love to know who was asking whether they could by-pass internal governance processes, which in my company, would be reason enough to report someone to internal governance. And they are ignoring all the advice they are given - look at this on the two one-way street ideas about large vehicle movements (like bin lorries).

But @Earl Aelfheah if there were suspicions then they have been vindicated not by the search itself but by the content of the emails - the content is there for all to see - surely you can acknowledge that. The smoking gun is not from the muzzle of those sending the FOI but those who wrote the emails. Surely you must acknowledge that something odd is going on when you read @Lebanums summary? I mean this is a potential PR disaster for the council and the councillors seeking election. Can anyone trust Southwark Labour anymore? Everything many of us feared regarding the way councils treat these processes and their constituents is being realised right now. Surely even you cannot defend the council this time round?

It is. Southwark Labour are treating residents with utter contempt. They have been doing it for years over LTNs and clearly thought they could get away with it again. This is what happens when organisations get away with abusing their power - they keep doing it. To be fair @Earl Aelfheah I saw your summary and then opened one of the documents (emails and other reports pdf) and saw far more aligned with @Lebanums summary than yours - did you not upload that file? That's where the juicy staff is! It may also have struggled as so much of it is redacted.

Ha ha, looks like @Earl Aelfheah got some, ahem, AI hallucination thrown in to their summary....

To be fair, we don't actually know you do - we will just have to take your word for it. But your posting history does arose suspicions.... All we have to go on is that you registered on the forum recently, have only posted about your support for the Ryedale LTN, yet claimed to not know what an LTN is, yet when you do start decide to start repeating activist research on how "good" LTNs are, you then claim to be an academic yourself and have experience of peer-reviewed research yet you apply results from said activist research as an example of what the Ryedale LTN will do yet have not acknowledged that the Ryedale LTN is very, very different from what the research surveyed - you're basically taking research for apples and applying it to pears and I am not sure that's sound academia. Has TFL ever funded any studies not by Aldred, Goodman et al......? Perhaps it might be a good time for them to start- oh sorry they can't can they as the multi-million pound pot for it was all given to them.....;-) Bottom-line remains that those who have fast-tracked this through, seemingly trying to by-pass proper process and scrutiny, have a lot of questions to answer.

Some who did a door-to-door signature petition to the council in relation to the Dulwich Village LTNs were told it could not be considered as it was not an official council petition and the council have not proof the folks hadn't made it all up. Was the online one on the Southwark council petition site? Is that a resident-led survey - it cannot be a council one as the asterisk's in the notes are way too leading for that to have been allowed on a council document. If it is a resident-led survey then this is why the council, has previously, said they cannot be counted because clearly those doing the survey know the outcome they want when they wrote the survey and its validity and legitimacy can be questioned. Could someone share the FOI documents, or a summary, here? Unfortunately, this is how Southwark labour treat their constituents - clearly someone wanted to get this in very quickly and I am sure the real reason why will come out in the wash. With local elections around the corner this may be a step too far for some but is very reflective of the way our elected officials treat the process and people around anything to do with active travel. Clearly someone was desperate to get this in play as a matter of urgently and someone needs to explain why the council was trying to circumvent its own internal procedures. And if there are FOI documents asking the Southwark legal team about exposure from the approach they are taking, clearly someone knew they were trying to bend/break the rules and not follow the process. Perhaps @Tori Griffiths can do some digging?

Amazing isnt it...someone who earlier purported to not even know what LTN stood for suddenly appears to be an expert on peer-reviewed documents from cycle lobbyists! 😉 P.S. has anyone seen anything of @Moondoox recently? There do seem to be a few first time posters trying to throw their weight behind the council's plans....hmmmm Absolutely spot on and whilst @Tori Griffiths may be throwing a vote for me and we will do a consultation line there is very little evidence that Southwark Labour will ever listen to the view of residents. Their motto is something along the lines of "never let the views of local residents get in the way of an active travel intervention that the lobbyists asked us to do". Seemingly only data analysed by activist researchers (one of who was an LCC employee, the other who is an LTN poster vandal and an active and leading member of the West Dulwich LTN campaign group - her husband runs it apparently) makes these claims...I mean the council's own limited data showed a 6% increase in traffic on Underhill after the Dulwich LTNs went in....but hey ho... Unfortunately TFL and the Mayor's office don't tend to fund research that shows its interventions are not working.

It does make you wonder why local councillors were in such a rush to get this in place. @Tori Griffiths as a resident of one of the local streets what are your views on the likely impact to others? Do you have any idea how this got approved so quickly without a proper consultation? Around 80% of local residents rejected the Dulwich Square closure during the official consultation.

If the FOI is correct it appears some at the council could not see the merit of it….and if that is the case you have to ask why some within the council felt so compelled to push it through.