Rockets

Lowlander....I am afraid you are missing something......67/68% of the people who responded to the CPZ consultation said they did not want a CPZ. If you are a shopkeeper who relies on footfall to sustain your business then the CPZ will bring misery and chaos....and probably put you out of business.

Wandered down to the meeting today at the library and to say it was shambolic was an understatement. The council had massively under estimated the number of people who would want to attend and hear from them and ask questions. When I arrived the line snaked down the stairs from the meeting room, into the library and out towards the street. We were told that the room, which held 100 people was at capacity and that we could follow the meeting on the stream. Someone suggested that perhaps the meeting should be postponed and the council find a more suitable location for it given so many people wanted to voice their views. There was much umming and ahhring and a lot of people left. After some time the council officials returned and suggested that they were postponing the non CPZ element of the meeting and they would run two concurrent meetings to accommodate the excessive numbers and present their CPZ findings and take questions. The majority of people suggested that the common sense approach was to postpone the meeting as they wanted to hear from all of the community that had attended, not have it split in two. At this point someone from the library told everyone not in the meeting room to leave the library as it was a health and safety issue. So everyone decamped to the pavement outside the library. Everyone outside was told that there would be a separate meeting that would start about an hour later after the first CPZ meeting concluded. People pointed out that many had already left as they had been turned away and that postponing the meeting was the best course of action. A councillor from West Dulwich came out and said that even though she agreed that the meeting should be postponed that it likely couldn?t be. She said she would recommend it to the chairman of the meeting. The feeling of the majority of those stuck outside the meeting was that the council were, once again, treating the electorate with contempt. Like many of those who attended for a 2.30pm start I could not stay for the 2nd meeting so I would be interested to know if any decision was taken on rescheduling the meeting or whether anyone has any info from either two of the meetings. The feeling was that if the council could postpone the non CPZ discussion element of the meeting then they should have done it for the CPZ discussion. But, as someone quite rightly pointed out, the council probably has to have a ?public meeting? as part of the process of implementing the CPZ so could not postpone it without impacting the start date for the CPZ. The whole CPZ process has been flawed from the beginning and today again gives weight to those who think that the council doesn?t care about the views of the residents of East Dulwich. Today was another sad day, another nail in the coffin for the democratic process.

James, Many thanks for your responses....I will take the slight typo in your response as a grammatical error rather than the mother of all Freudian slips!! ;-) And I quote.... You are absolutely correct that the overwhelming majority of people in East Dulwich, and in my ward, do not want a CPZ. I will ensure, therefore, that the overwhelming majority of people in East Dulwich and in my ward do live in one. But your response highlights the issue so many people have with the process and "result". Whether any particular street is in the CPZ or not, all the residents in your ward will be impacted by the CPZ. Those people who voted against it will have their streets blighted by the impact from the small number of streets that voted for it. There will be displacement and more parking pressure on those streets without the CPZ. So, the council's decision will impact everyone in East Dulwich and that's why many of us want our elected representatives to do more and represent the views of the majority and take a stand against it. The concerns on the impact to Lordship Lane are real and being deliberately overlooked by the council. I know you are suggesting to reduce the number of roads having a CPZ but, to be fair, that's like asking someone if they want to be punched in the face by both fists or just one.....and the oldest political trick in the book ;-) I think it is imperative that the council realises the detailed results of the consultation to everyone so we can all see what the true picture is. There is still an underlying concern that the council has railroaded these plans through against the will of the majority of people who will be impacted. And that the council has done everything in its power to get the result it wanted - I have yet to hear a response from the council on why the double-yellow lines were extended to the full legal limit months before the CPZ consultation was initiated. To most of us it just looks like an attempt to create parking pressure to help get people to vote for a CPZ. 8,000 people signed a petition in an attempt to save Lordship Lane and that has been given but lip service by the council. Add to those 8,000 the 68% who voted against the CPZ and there are a lot of disgruntled voters out there who feel local councillors are putting party politics ahead of the needs of their constituents. One can only presume you feel secure with your majority or you have been promised a plum job should you lose your seat in the next council elections........ BTW will you and the other councillors for the area be at the public meeting on the 27th?

Rollflick and Chuckd - don't you see - the council has been, and continues to play, the CPZ jigsaw game? They put one piece in place here and they know that soon they will have to put another piece in there and before you know it everyone has a CPZ and then they'll start charging more and more for the permits and the meters and then everyone will realise what a folly it is and benefits no-one other than the council and their revenue generation plans. That's why so many of us are opposing it with all our might; putting the needs of the many and the vibrancy of our area ahead of the needs and wants of the few.

James, Thank you for your response. The over-whelming majority of residents in East Dulwich, and particularly your ward, do not want the CPZ - that is abundantly clear - as they are worried about the impact it will have on the area as a whole. One stat that stood out was that 25% of all respondents raised concerns about the impact on Lordship Lane. These responses were unprompted, as there was not a question asking this, and that is huge. The concerns are real and are being overlooked by you and the council. We all knew the council would force a CPZ through and create a process to "justify" implementation. As Kissinger famously said to a group of media: "Has anyone got any questions for my answers", the council has created a process and consultation document to railroad a CPZ through, knowing full well that if they get a CPZ in one area this will create challenges in neighbouring areas and will help them justify future CPZ expansion. The council carefully created a consultation document that deliberately did not ask whether people wanted it in the area - just their street. We all know if the question about a CPZ in the area had been asked the council would not be able to implement it - that's why it was not asked. But I am not so sure it is a clear cut as I actually think the wording of the consultation may create issues for the council and further analysis of the results will be required. For example, could you to address these questions: - how was the undecided category determined - does that mean votes were equally split between for and against? - how will the council manage the split results through Melbourne Grove as it is clear one half wants it - the other doesn't and any impact on those roads who voted against it? (I know you are trying to address this) - why have you not seen the data - you are the elected official for the area and I would have thought it was vital you have the data to hand before you sent your note about your suggestions for tweaks to the plan? - which two streets did not respond and do we know why they didn't respond? - What have you done to champion the views of the traders represented in your ward? The sense of frustration people feel is that we would have hoped that someone from the elected representatives in the ward would have taken a more pragmatic approach and say - we cannot impose a CPZ on the area - there is, bar a small cluster of streets within the VRA area, overwhelming sentiment that this is not what the area wants. The impact of any CPZ will be felt across the breadth of your ward and that is why people have campaigned so hard against it - they know that any CPZ in the area will be damaging. From day one it has been clear you have supported the CPZ and have done little to champion the true feelings of the ward you represent. The traders have been consistent in their message that all of the local councillors have not shown any interest in their concerns and it was shocking watching the video of the council meeting how the VRA were given an enthusiastic round of applause by the councillors and yet the independent traders were not given such a rousing reception. It was clear to all from the body language in that room that we were heading for a CPZ in the area and the VRA were the shills to help it happen. It is good to see you trying to get the size of the CPZ reduced but, to be honest, it feels like closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. I think a lot of us just wish you had been more active from day one, had put party politics aside and had better represented the views your constituents.

Repost, ha ha...nothing like a debate on private schools to bring out the prejudice in people...;-)

James, The challenge you face is that this whole process has highlighted why so many people have lost faith in politics and politicians. It was obvious to everyone what the result was going to be, and that was the result the council wanted a CPZ to raise revenue and skewed the process to ensure it happened. When the majority in the consultation area voted against it the council reduced the size of the area to create a "majority" and even then a large number of the roads impacted voted against but get it anyway - that is not democracy. You represent a ward that overwhelmingly voted against the CPZ yet you pull the party line putting party politics ahead of the desires of the majority of your constituents. This is why people are sick of politics. You represent a ward where traders are massively concerned about the impact of the CPZ on their livelihoods yet you, and your party, have neglected them allowing them to become collateral damage. The more we all look at the results the more we realise what a whitewash this has been. At some point I hope an elected official will actually stand up for the views and desires of the majority of their constituents - I would vote for them and I am sure lots of others would. 69% of the respondents in the consultation area voted against it yet the area still gets a CPZ that will impact all. How is that democratic?

Cllr Mcash - do you have any thoughts on the hours of operation of parking that I suggested? Surely implementing a 9.30am - 10.30am CPZ in those roads would both protect those roads from commuter parking but also protect Lordship Lane as a vibrant local community? I am afraid this consultation has been everything the majority of local residents feared it would be.....an absolute whitewash. The consultation process, the public meetings and the recommendation report are the outputs of a council that is manipulating the results to give it the decision it wants. Just 18% of all roads polled voted for a CPZ.....yet everyone will feel the impact. If this is modern democracy in action then we are all in trouble....

I don't think the council have a mandate to impose this - this is madness. Take a look at the numbers... Street-by-street analysis shows that within the whole study area 15 streets supported a parking zone while 54 streets were against. 10 streets were undecided and there was no response from two streets. Figure 2 below shows, based on responses, majority support in green, majority against in red, and undecided in blue. So because 18% of the total streets covered voted for a CPZ everyone gets impacted.....is this the new democracy?

James, A couple of comments: Question 1: size of the zone Can you break out for us which streets actually voted for or against in the Melbourne Grove zone as the documentation says: 14 streets were in favour of a parking zone, 12 were not in favour and 8 were undecided. I think that may be interesting in determining the size of the zone. Question 2: Hours of operation The all-day recommendation is overkill. If the council is trying to alleviate commuter parking but wants to protect Lordship lane then the hours of operation need to be two hours - I would even suggest that a one-hour slot between 9am and 10am would be the most sensible option if you want to protect parking spaces from commuters and the thriving local community. To be fair the more I look at it the recommendation seems to have more holes in it than Blair's Iraq WMD dossier....;-)

Errr not really RedPost....of the 2,244 people who responded to the consultation document who live within the boundary area 69% voted against it. The 54% figure you state is the council's cherry-picking of supportive responses to justify the implementation in a subset of the overall consultation area....they have cut the area to give them the justification they need.

A parking zone ?Melbourne Grove zone? to be implemented in the area bordered by and including Grove Vale, by the western boundary of the study area, by and excluding Lordship Lane and excluding a small group of side streets to Melbourne Grove in the south of the area (Lytcott Grove, Playfield Crescent and Colwell Road). There was majority support (54%) for a zone from respondents in this area Melbourne Grove zone to operate all day 8.30am to 6.30pm, Monday to Friday comprising different types of bays including permit and paid (visitors able to pay for up to 4 hours, ?2.75 per hour for petrol, ?3.25 per hour for diesel), short stay bays (see It's the whitewash many of us feared.....the fact that it is all day makes no sense as commuter parking would be impacted by a two-hour timing just as much all day. The council is showing this is nothing about the issue but all about money and that they care not on jot for Lordship Lane as a thriving business community....

https://consultations.southwark.gov.uk/environment-leisure/eastdulwichparking/results/eastdulwichparkingconsultation-interimreportfinal.pdf It's inbound.....

Galileo, No that is not what I am arguing. Re-read the feedback from the meeting that 5imon posted and I am sure you will see that is but one consideration and part of the broader opposition to the proposals. Whether you agree with private schools or not that community does use the Belair car park to safely drop their children at school and their voice needs to be heard and the fear with this council is that they will turn their noses up at anyone who they don't approve of - and we all know the Labour party's views on private schools. I understand that the councillor who attended was quite dismissive when these points were raised, seemingly letting their own prejudices cloud the discussion. The displacement of parking from car parks like Belair to surrounding roads will not only create safety issues for the children being dropped off but also give the council more justification for CPZs in that area too. I watched with interest the council meeting on the YouTube channel in relation to the CPZ and it is clear we are going to get CPZs borough-wide. The shills of the Vale Residents Association turned up and regurgitated the same TFL and council stated propaganda and got a rip-roaring round of applause, whilst the shopkeepers and the 10,000 people who support them in their quest to not have a CPZ got a muted response from the elected representatives. When Cllr Livingstone got up and said how things had improved greatly in his area since the implementation of the CPZ I think we all know which way things are going to go.

Yes I believe the schools are Oakfield and Dulwich Prep early years and the issue there is that the catchment areas are huge so many people drive and aren?t able to walk as Galileo suggests. But as far as this council is concerned charging people who send their children to private school is to be encouraged! I love the fact that the council says they would entertain not charging for parking if people could suggest other revenue generating opportunities....they have to be careful as when we all see the wastage they are so famed for this approach may backfire....like the 42k on the Love Dulwich lampposts....

Tomskip.... Corbynista agenda.... 2.99% council tax rise 8.00% GLA rise Extension of double yellow lines to create parking pressure across the area to help justify stealth taxes... ?125 a year for a CPZ parking permit sold on false and misleading info ?30 a year to have your brown bins emptied Trying to sneak green space car park parking charges through without anyone noticing..... ....all under the umbrella of ?central govt cuts?. I get it that councils have lost funding (and I am not suggesting the Tories are any better) but at some point that narrative wears a bit thin as a catch-all excuse for their actions. We are seeing the first buds of the Marxist agenda now anyone other than the hard left has been forced out of the Labour Party, so if you own a car or have a garden expect your council to come after you and stealth tax you. They will say ?but our charges are the lowest across the capital? but this is just the start. As Stealers Wheel so aptly put it...Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right....

I suspect the council's thinking here is if you have a garden and need a brown bin you can probably afford to pay for it to be emptied....all part of their Corbynista agenda.....

The Friends of Belair Park have organised a meeting with Southwark Council to dispute the parking charges. If you want to make your voice heard the meeting will take place on Saturday 30th March 2019 at 2.30pm at Belair Recreation Rooms (Gallery Road). Friends of Belair are encouraging as many people as possible to attend.

You would expect a local councillor to be aware of such an initiative as it would impact his constituents....wouldn't you? The fact James B seems to be on top of this more than James M speaks volumes....a stealth tax so stealthy that even the local councillors seem unaware of it.... Additionally aren't you supposed to put food waste in the brown bin, will they refuse to collect it if it has garden waste in it?

Trust has to be earned and the Tooley St mob are doing nothing to earn it right now. Maximum 2.99% permissible council tax rise (along with the 8% GLA rise) plus their stealth taxes with the CPZ, park car park charges and now rumours of a brown bin tax as well.....when challenged they will moan on and on about cuts in central funding yet on a per household basis the rise in local taxes when all the stealth taxes are rolled up could well be huge.....over 50% year on year. It will be interesting to see how the electorate reacts come the next council elections. This is the type of thing that will mobilise people to actually vote and whilst I am convinced Southwark will always be red there might be some shocks for ward councillors who have stood back and let it happen.

They will create a subset of a subset of a subset to justify going ahead with the CPZ and to get them to the "outweigh" threshold they require - i.e. +1 in favour. They have already said they will discount the 8,000 signatures against the proposals collected by Lordship Lane traders and their website to garner responses is carefully designed to ensure they engineer a favourable result. Livingstone is moving the goalposts cos he knows the majority don't want it. As I have said before the Labour slogan has recently been changed to For the Few, Not the Many!!!

ED_moots - you are right this is very much like Brexit: - "locals" worried about parking immigration and "outsiders" taking their parking spaces - a campaign group (the council) pushing inaccurate and misleading information to help fool the electorate into voting for it - an electorate who could end up voting for something that they live to regret and can't undo which ultimately benefits no-one other than the people who dreamt up the idea..... sorry I couldn't resist ;-)

Southwark have already decided what they want to do - they decided it before the consultation process began and that was to have a CPZ across the whole of East Dulwich and surrounding areas to further tax car ownership. Everyone knows that no matter what anyone in East Dulwich says we are going to get a CPZ. Over 8,000 signatures have been collected by traders on Lordship Lane opposing the move but these will be discounted. The council's own research showed that East Dulwich was thriving and a lot of that came from people driving from postcodes beyond SE22 and SE5 but they are choosing to ignore this. Sanda - be careful what you wish for. Your negative experience of Corbyn in Islington will likely become the norm in East Dulwich - remember, the affluent are the enemy and Southwark have been circling East Dulwich for years and now have self-professed Marxist councillors "representing" our community. I think a lot of people have been taking a stand as they see this as the tip of the iceberg and have looked closely at the CPZ proposal and seen the only outcome is that people will pay ?125 a year for a scheme that will only provide a temporary rest-bite and that with the plans for double-yellows across drop kerbs there will actually be a net-loss of parking spaces on many streets. Throw in the council fast-tracking charging to park at the local parks and it is clear what the motive is here. And the council will default to the "cuts in central govt funding" narrative but that is what council tax increases are designed to help alleviate. Given the council is going to force a CPZ on the community I think the best solution would be a 9.00am to 10.00am controlled parking zone which alleviates the commuter and long-term parking issue but allows East Dulwich to continue to thrive. This would be a commonsense approach but we know that Southwark Council and commonsense are like oil and water....

Can I ask why the group representing these roads gives no indication on the preferred times of operation for the CPZ they so desire? Surely that should be a key element of the feedback to the council? If you were both convinced that commuters were the sole source of the problem and that you are keen to protect the local independent traders then maybe suggesting the hours of operation to be, say, between 9am and 10am would deal with the issue on your streets whilst trying to protect the local businesses? Or is the preference that parking spaces are reserved for the sole use of residents throughout the whole day? Ed_Pete I fear the residents voting for this will find that the yellow line impact will be huge. I did my own very unscientific research recently on many of the roads near the station quite late at night after returning from a football match in town and along Melbourne Grove I counted 6 free spaces not filled with cars which suggests residents were filling the remainder. Take away the spaces lost to the drop curbs and there would be a net loss of parking spaces. I do hope people aren?t convincing themselves to be the turkeys who voted for Christmas on the sole motivation that they will be able to park outside their house. The impact of the CPZ is far greater than a few roads near the station and those residents who live there and I think this is reflected in the 8,000 signatures the traders managed to get to oppose the CPZ in any form.

rahrahrah Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > The only thing which is clear, is that the whole > of the surrounding area is destined to become a > CPZ. I agree. If you look at the plans to charge in the Dulwich and Belair car parks it is obvious people will park in the surrounding streets which currently have no CPZs which will act as further justification from the council to extend CPZs to the whole area. Especially considering Belair Park car park is used by parents taking their children to and from Oakfield and Dulwich Prep. It?s pretty transparent what the council?s plans are and no matter what any of the residents say they will vigorously pursue their plans to completion and engage in a folly consultation process. When are the next council elections...given the strength of feeling against the council right now perhaps we can mobilise and vote for a change ward by ward? Also, I think you?ll find most of the councillors don?t actually live in the area they are wreaking havoc upon and are part of Corbyn?s Marxist Momentum crew so probably care little for the ?posh folk? in East Dulwich.