Rockets

And therein lies the issue - people don't leave their private bikes in the middle of pavements for a days at a time until they use them next but people using hires bikes can and do - because that is the business model - you leave it where you want because the plan is that someone else will use it and move it to the next place and so it repeats.... It means the business model is built on the ability to leave the bikes where you want/need.

It was even more chaotic this morning as the contra-flow they have put in has effectively closed the A205 and the impact is being felt all over South East London with complete gridlock as far back as Catford with people trying to find ways around the works. Perhaps more worrying is I called Thames Water about it this morning to see how long it is likely to take and they have no details on their system about it - they thought it was the metering works!

Given the way e-scooters are just dumped all over the place I suspect that the operators aren't too keen to punish the riders. I was in Rome recently and they have awful problems with e-scooters (the streets in the centre of Rome are just littered with them) and are actively trying to resolve many of the issues that we are seeing here - hopefully TFL and councils don't repeat many of the mistakes others have made. https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/rome-scooter-problems/index.html

Wow...if this is correct this is the most damning evidence we have seen...but probably validates what a lot of us have been saying for a long time about the real impact of LTNs.... More evidence is emerging that LTNs are not cutting traffic – one of the main reasons for imposing them. According to an investigation by the Times, Department for Transport (DfT) figures show that vehicle miles driven rose by an average of 11.4% in the ten inner London boroughs that introduced LTNs in 2020. By contrast, in the two inner London boroughs that didn’t introduce LTNs, vehicle miles driven rose by an average of only 8.9%. (In Southwark, which has ten LTNs, vehicle miles driven rose by 13% between 2020 and 2021.)

It is a joke - Thames Water seem incapable of fixing the issues on that stretch and they seem to have problems with alarming regularity. I appreciate these are emergency works so do not need integrated or forward-planning but the impact they are having on congestion levels along huge parts of the A205 is not acceptable. It seems to be happening every couple of weeks - is anyone trying to hold Thames Water to account? I walked down East Dulwich Grove earlier and the traffic was queuing from the Dulwich Village junction back beyond Melbourne Grove towards Lordship Lane and I suspect that is linked to these issues on the A205.

Malumbu - your nirvana doesn't exist I am afraid so, in the meantime, we should probably avoid measures that don't actually make the problem worse by increaseing congestion and pollution so maybe a time for a rethink on LTNs as they seem to be roundly failing. In addition to the One Dulwich update I would suggest people also complain about the abuse and bullying of TFL staff by council representatives/councillors - it needs to be made a matter of public record, investigated and action taken against those who were responsible for it and we need to hear from the council on what steps are being taken to ensure TFL staff can work without being abused and reduced to tears - it's utterly uncalled for.

Those works have been causing chaos on the A205 as nothing can get down Lordship Lane (due to the temporary lights) - it's causing gridlock affecting Sydenham Hill, Forest Hill and as far back as Tulse Hill in the other direction.

We are reaping what we sowed in that regard - I was amazed at the number of people who, despite their opposition to what councillors were doing locally with LTNs etc, voted Labour to stick it to Boris et al - needless to say they are now moaning about what Labour councillors are doing at a local level with the latest raft of LTN idiocy and I am reminding them they are a partial cause of the problem - now we have idiots running us at a national level and idiots running us at a local level! It is clear though that the only witch-hunt has been waged by Labour councillors on TFL staff and let's hope someone holds them to account and I hope that even the most ardent pro-LTN supporter can see that Labour councillor behaviour has crossed a line and has been utterly unacceptable - I would expect this from Tories not from Labour.

It is very weird isn't it as the Turney Road one is accurate - is this another deliberate "oversight" by the council - you would have thought they would have been being very careful in that regard given the previous oversights in relation to LTNs?! This is a very misleading representation of the changes being suggested and, at best, reeks of a lack of care and professionalism on the part of the council, at worst looks like a deliberate attempt to manipulate the consultation. I am perhaps more concerned by the extension of the deadline - do we know why it has been extended? If you remember the last time a deadline was extended it was done so so the council could send people around knocking on doors to pressgang people into responding as the initial responses didn't support the outcome they wanted. Should we presume that the results are not to the council's liking again this time and they need more time to create a more positive outcome for them? It sounds like a lot of people in the area are very much against the closure of Turney Road (and it appears about 80% of the residents on the affected part of Turney Road itself)?

And this from Cllr Rose is telling too.... I’m having to push back on the TfL report and defend the scheme again, it’s important that we don’t end up back to square one in the public debate over Dulwich and keeping the junction closure permanent, so any insights and support from your enquiries would be much appreciated. In other words - fix your report for us. It's clear councillors have been exerting a huge amount of pressure on TFL and the fact that Will Norman had to intervene speaks volumes. Also the fact that councillors are no longer allowed to reach out direct to TFL demonstrates where the problem stems from and it's clear the councillors (in their enthusiasm to maintain the - everything is great with the Dulwich LTNs narrative) have created huge problems and seem to have been bullying TFL staff to the point where they have been reduced to tears. But none of this can come as a surprise to anyone who has seen how the council and councillors have treated residents with utter contempt from the day this all started and this is just the icing on the cake and reflective of people who are never held to account for their actions. Our councillors should be ashamed of themselves and I really hope there has been some disciplinary proceedings against the protagonists - but I doubt it.

Wow, just wow......this does not paint a good picture of our councillors and the way they treat other people (in this case TFL....abusing and reducing TFL staff to tears....). It shows how bad things have got that Will Norman had to intervene and TFL has told local councillors not to engage directly with them....I wonder if Kieron Williams will take any action against those involved - I very much doubt it given his track record with the likes of Leo Pollack? Given what we have seen from our Labour councillors during the LTN fiasco nothing comes as any surprise anymore and Labour councillors appear to be trying to bully their way to the resolution they want. A reminder that it was Cllr Leeming who accidentally sent the report (that he was trying to get redacted before publication) to residents - it looks like Will Norman is trying to remind Cllr Rose that it was Leeming's mistake that was the trigger for this and the abuse of TFL staff is completely unwarranted. This thread is really quite shocking and we deserve to hear a response from Cllr Rose and any of those councillors involved.

Malumbu, we are thinking wider that’s why many of us are posing the questions the pro-lobby often choose to overlook! ;-) I think it is clear scooters are not replacing car journeys but walking and public transport and therefore there are minimal climate change benefits - in fact their impact may be detrimental - those battery packs alone that they have to replace constantly will have a significant negative environmental impact. Greenwashing is the act of falsely upping your environmental credentials - i.e. councils able to say we are supporting green initiatives like e-scooters to promote active travel.

The big question will be what types of journeys are these replacing - I very much doubt they are car journeys so if they are either walking or public transport then there will likely be a negative environmental impact by their use. I suspect councils are using these for a bit of greenwashing but don't properly understand the long-term impact in terms of environmental (both climate change and littering etc - every European city has a big littering problem with them dumped all over the place and the same debate is raging in most of them - are they actually worth it?).

I think you will find the complaints are because the council was supposed to be consulting local people on what they wanted to be in the square and yet they have gone ahead and started amending the square before the consultation has started properly. They are also complaining because the consultation offers people two versions of the same option, both of which incorporate the measures they have already started installing....they complain because the council has seemingly decided what happens with the square after engaging only with self-interest groups and are retrospectively engaging with wider groups as a tick boxing exercise to validate the plans they are installing. That is not what they promised us would happen. That is why people are angry. They have lied to us - again. P.S. Oh and whilst the materials may be cheap I am sure the installation of the children's TV set seats did not come cheaply.

If that is the case it does beg the question why have they been installed and at what cost. The council seems to be happy to fritter money on follies such as this whilst at the same time bemoan a lack of funding for essential services etc. Local sentiment seems to be very much that these additions are laughable and the council has lost all sense of reality when it comes to this junction. Many of our neighbours are so angry with the way the current consultation is being run as they realise the council gives no consideration to the views of those who dare voice an opinion other than the one they hold. The fact they are wasting money adding these items at the beginning of yet another corrupt consultation process just feels like them flicking the v's at many of their constituents.

Do the Rainbow seats (will our councillors appear on them dressed as Zippy and Bungle during the grand opening?) stay once the consultation has been completed and local residents have had their say on the proposed designs or are the council, ahem, pre-empting the result of their consultation and installing the new design ahead of time?

Time to move on....ha ha...you can't get this lounged Malumbu (you may have already realised this from your multiple previous attempts)....some of us don't like the way the our council has bullied their way to rolling these out. If we, as you suggest, stand by and let them get away with it, then they will deceive again and again. Don't turn a blind eye because one day you will not like something they (and I appreciate Southwark aren't your council do I am using the royal "they") do and you won't have a leg to stand on...be careful what you wish for...

Rosendale is always good.

Looks like someone went to a Cbeebies garage sale and bought the set from a children's TV programme......it's beyond a joke now...how much money are they wasting on this white elephant?

The devil is very much in the detail isn't it. Interesting that on a road like East Dulwich Grove parts of it are consistently breaking the pre-Covid levels yet traffic (according to the council) is still not at pre-Covid levels across the borough. Also, does the council allow us to compare previous dashboards as, correct me if I am wrong, but more of the dashboard is turning orange and red than before? What caused the drop in traffic on Lordship Lane Central in May as that looks like the chart has been corrected or altered given the previous trends.

Absolutely, side road or back street cycling has always been the safest option - I used to cycle to Hammersmith and only once or twice on the route needed to go on busier roads. But LTNs were built on the premise that side-road traffic was increasing - which it wasn't - that narrative was built on dodgy data that has since been corrected and now shows that traffic levels are decreasing and would decrease more if it was not for the get it now delivery culture that most are embracing that has led to an increase in van traffic. LTNs were also built on the premise of a car-led recovery, which again, did not happen. They were also built on the promise of a modal shift to bikes which again, did not happen. But what has happened is that congestion has increased (particularly clear to anyone who spends anytime around Dulwich) around peak travel times as those fewer cars are being forced along fewer roads. So we are left wondering why are council's continuing to pursue this ludicrous strategic initiative when it is clear it is not delivering and installing even more measures (Turney) that will put increased pressure on roads (and residents) around the Village and Croxted Road etc.

One Dulwich latest update - seems like the Turney closure came as a surprise to even those who have been granted an audience with the council - one wonders who was lobbying for it then and why the council didn't mention it to anyone..... Campaign Update | 11 Oct URGENT ACTION NEEDED Southwark updated its ‘Dulwich Village – streets for people’ website with two design ideas for the Dulwich Village junction yesterday, 10 October. To everyone’s astonishment, both designs include the closure of Turney Road at the Dulwich Village end. This has never been raised before, and wasn’t mentioned at One Dulwich’s online meeting last week. The Council has provided no information at all on the likely effects of the Turney Road closure on a) access for local residents or people working in Dulwich, or b) the displacement of traffic and congestion on to surrounding roads and in the Dulwich area as a whole. Consultation/engagement closes on 30 October, meaning that there are now just 19 days left to respond. PLEASE ACT NOW We are asking you to take five urgent actions: 1. Comment on the design proposals here. It takes only a few minutes. Question 2 We suggest you answer ‘Don’t support’, as no evidence has been provided to suggest that any of the core objectives could be delivered. Question 3 Please ask the Council to allow access for Blue Badge holders, GPs, community nurses and midwives, SEND transport and social care workers so that the most vulnerable in the community are looked after. Question 4 Please object to the closure of Turney Road because there is no information about the likely impact on access or traffic displacement. Question 5 cannot be answered, because there is no way of rejecting both design proposals and Questions 6 and 7 are irrelevant. We suggest you leave all these blank. 2. Email [email protected] to say that the online survey does not allow you to reject both design proposals, so you have left question 5 blank, but that you would like email confirmation by return that Southwark Council has recorded your rejection of both design proposals on the grounds that insufficient information has been provided about the impact of the closure to motorised vehicles of a) Turney Road and b) not one but two arms of the junction. 3. Email [email protected] to say (in your own words if possible, please) that the consultation process on the design of the Dulwich Village junction is deeply flawed because: we have been given no data or modelling to show the likely impact of the closure to motorised vehicles of either a) Turney Road, or b) two out of the four arms of the junction; we were promised that engagement would take place with local people (residents, businesses, campaign groups) BEFORE concept designs were presented (Phase 1 interviewed only a ‘representative sample’ – and didn’t ask where people lived – so did not capture the views of the community); the deadline of 30 October gives us insufficient time to respond; the online survey does not allow respondents to reject both design options; no local councillor is willing to champion the needs of residents or businesses who object to the scheme; no council officer is willing to act on legitimate concerns raised by local people about the lack of motorised access for those with protected characteristics, or for those who care for them. 4. Email Southwark’s chief executive [email protected] to complain, using any or all of the above points, and adding your own personal perspective. 5. Sign the epetition (now working) on Southwark’s website (not our petition but we support its aims) asking the Council to ensure access through the junction for the most vulnerable. Thank you for your support. The One Dulwich Team

Legal - was the electric bike in question that green electric bike delivery monster truck that jumped the red lights at Turney and shot up the hill - I didn't catch which company it was but they should know that their riders are driving recklessly - a number of people commented on it as he was going at an unsafe speed and driving through the junction without a care for anyone else using it? Far too many times I see cyclists, whether lycra-clad weekend Olympic road warriors on their £10k bikes or electric bikes bombing through that junction - anyone who walks that way knows that fear of dread when you hear the ominous sound of an expensive gear train on a carbon-fibre bike approaching at speed! ;-) The school issue is a big one that is not going away and I do then chuckle to myself when I see posts like the one below from people who were no doubt complaining that too many people were driving to drop their children at Alleyn's and now the children are using coaches still aren't happy.....

Unfortunately Rahx3 is very much part of the problem not the solution and their views are so reflective of the many blinkered pro-cycle brigade that have commanded more attention with the council than they warrant over the last few years. As long as cyclists are happy then stuff anyone else. My problem with the plans is, again, the council is not offering anyone the opportunity to argue against the measures - the "consultation" has been designed to ensure they get the measures through whether local people want them or not. These councillors are the same ones who take every opportunity to rail against government for underhand tactics yet are more than happy to use such tactics when it suits their agenda. It is such hypocrisy on a massive scale and I sense there is going to be another wave of constituent discontent with these plans, certainly many of our neighbours have not had any say thus far and are incredulous that the council suggests there has been any engagement with local people - the amount of our money that the council is wasting on these cycle lobby pandering vanity projects is unbelievable and the DV junction is being turned into an extension of the Herne Hill velodrome to the benefit of one group and no-one else. It's time it stopped and the council take a more balanced approach that is inclusive of everyone who uses the spaces.

And here is the second proposed design.