East Dulwich Road traffic jam: a proposal

[Lee Scoresby]

The problem : the junction where East Dulwich Road meets Peckham Rye (AKA Kings on the Rye). Where yobs roar down the right lane and push into the left to go straight ahead. All made infinitely worse by the fanatical determination of the faceless ones who phase these traffic lights to keep an open road between Peckham and Forest Hill - never mind that traffic tails back up over the hill past Goose Green to Grove Vale.

I propose:

- Twin roundabouts to replace this light-controlled junction and its oppo on the Nunhead side, nipping into the corners of Peckham Rye, even losing a couple of plane trees (oo, is that screaming I hear?)

- The short stretch between becomes a 2x2-lane dual carriageway, with both footpaths relocated back behind the trees (demolishing the loo block).

- The 484 goes round the bottom of the triangle and come up to a relocated bus stop - ending the peek-a-boo that 343/484 users are presently forced to play.

- The end of Fenwick Rd is closed, to stop rat-run vehicles barging out into the flow.

We have a great deal of traffic in this city; let us at least manage vehicular flow rather more intelligently.

Lee Scoresby

[ratty]

The junction is awful and the phasing of the lights makes people hurry and jump the reds, contributing to the number of accidents and fatalities at the junction. Something really needs to be done!!

[Townleygreen]

Lee's proposal looks eminently sensible.

The junction is just dangerous at present, and very frustrating for your average normal driver who is not prepared to behave like an idiot.

[Frankito]

I have a problem turning right at that junction. The lights are never in our favour - the least they could do would be to create a filter for us Forest Hill Rd users...

Lee, I do have a bit of an issue with roundabouts and that is that they can sometimes pose danger to the less savvy pedestrian..

[Lee Scoresby]

Further to: the east side of Peckham Rye (Road), between the Rye's Peckham apex and where East Dulwich Road becomes Nunhead Lane, might work better as an uphill one-way.

Also, the controllers' mono-maniacal determination that the up/down flow is favoured over the cross flow has some obscure connection to their having made a right horlicks of traffic flow down at the bottom of the Rye.

Anyway, thanx for the feedback.

Roundabout or not, part of the problem is that this 2011 urban light-system is just mechanical. In other countries, these systems are intelligent, responding to local stimuli (which can be as simple as ground pressure lines) or linked into area control rooms. Not in Southwark. Anywhere in London? I don't know.

ratty's point is poignantly well made. Even the memorial tree to the young girl who died there in the latter half of last year, still to be seen quietly decaying, does not move the great ones off their municipal chuffs.

Frankito, part of your problem turning right is the yobs wanting to move ahead in the RH lane and cut left. Also, both sets of lights only have 2 phases. Some traffic engineering protocols would erect a low barrier between LH and RH lanes, say from Fenwick Rd to the junction. But I suspect the yobs would then just barge across the crossroad itself.

And responding to Frankito's point about roundabouts and pedestrians:

- Crossings at the edge of roundabouts are more dangerous when the traffic is incoming. The Highway Code (gawd bless it!) is very clear about the danger of zooming past a vehicle approaching a crossing, let alone one that has stopped. I have nearly been hit in this way both at Goose Green and elsewhere.

- Crossings near roundabouts also appear more dangerous when they are (pedestrian's initiative) zebra crossings, rather than light controlled.

- However, lousy urban junctions and other badly managed road situations are far more dangerous than marked crossings. I am suspicious of the traffic planners' impulse to corral walkers and oblige them to walk where they do not want to go. But I refuse to believe a safe solution cannot be designed.

- Generally, I emphatically reject the entire chuckle-headed philosophy of London traffic safety, with its bogus 20mph zones, ambiguous orange ground markings (hey, they work really well in some quiet provincial Dutch town!), and all the other hands-off walk-away cosmetic stuff. The problem is not the vast majority of non-idiot drivers (like Townleygreen) but the hard core of immature yobs, sometimes uninsured and unlicenced. London local authorities are really-really enthusiastic about issuing parking penalties. What London NEEDS is a helluva lot more detection and prosecution of what the Americans call 'moving violations'.

Lee Scoresby

[Frankito]

Great stuff Lee, you obviously know your stuff. How do we get it on the right radar... Therein lies the challenge...

[Ximena]

Frankito Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Great stuff Lee, you obviously know your stuff.

> How do we get it on the right radar... Therein

> lies the challenge...

Hi! Frankito

I have pm you some redirections about the traffic jum.

[Frankito]

I didn't get it...

[Ximena]

Frankito Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I didn't get it...

:-S

[Frankito]

:)-D to Ximena... Ya sabes porque...

[Marilin]

My Spanish is not that good but I will try.Que pasa me lo puedes contar !

Espero que sean buenas noticias y sobre todo positivo. Ja..h !

[Frankito]

Que nivel... haces bien. Por aqui todo bien:)-D

[stoo31]

I think another problem with this junction is the bus lane on East Dulwich Road. It's such a small pointless stretch. If cars were able to queue in 2 lanes all the way down the hill that would eradicate a lot of the problem.

The bus lane benefits no one because the fact that it causes a queue back past where it is a single lane negates any benefit a bus gets when it finally reaches the bus lane.

[The Nappy Lady]

Lee,

I completely agree, and have said myself we could easily lose a corner of the common to create an much improved junction with a roundabout.

The bus lane leading up to the lights when approaching from ED towards Peckham causes real problems, the phasing on the lights is all wrong & it is, overall a nightmare of a junction.

However, I shudder at the thought of the chaos involved in such large scale improvements.

[PeckhamRose]

I have tried over many many years (literally so, the local councillors and ex ex councillors can back this up) to improve the safety especially at the junctions where we / I have to turn right to go up Peckham Rye (east SE15 side).

I argued for a roundabout at the junction where the traffic lights now stand. When it was clear they were installed Traffic Lights we begged for a filter light to turn right, but they ignored us all.

Meanwhile, talking on here is pointless. If everyone went to Community Councils and / or wrote to the Highways Dept and so on, it might be more effective than just the few of us who used to be ar$sed to do so.

[elloriac]

When I moved here last year, I was horrified by trying to turn right at that junction. I emailed my local councillors who were sitting on the relevant committees, only to receive absolutely no reply from any of them. Which was nice.

So now I just cut through the residential roads instead. It may be slower & there may be humps, but at least I'm not going to be hit by on-coming traffic running the lights.

I will try again with the Highways Dept.

[DJKillaQueen]

This junction is part of the next two year phase of planned road improvements work. It is work funded by TFL and has always required consutation with TFL before any changes were made. Outside of that the local council are powerless to make any substantial changes.

The main problem with this jucntion is that it is overused at peak times, not helped by the high number of nearby residential roads that are blocked to through traffic use. One of the major issues is working out how to manage both pedestrian and vehicle crossings at this junction. All that longer phasing of anything will do is create longer but faster moving tailbacks. Right turn filtering is under consideration along with better enforcement of the current highway rules (the breaking of which cause most accidents).

[elloriac]

how does one define 'overused' in relation to a road junction?

[PeckhamRose]

Sounds all well and good DJKQ but the fact is there is a lot of traffic at those junctions caused by 1) the fact that Foresters Road was cut off to traffic going up Peckham Rye so now it all has to come all the way to where the traffic lights now are - and 2) traffic lights by their existance, especially when in close proximity to other traffic lights, cause congestion when lights are red, specially if there is nothing actually crossing on the green lights at the cross junction. I have said it before and I shall say it again!: I do not have a problem with cyclists going over red lights. It makes perfect sense. There are too many red lights, and the cyclists are exercising their common sense and road skill by crossing when it is safe for them to do so (in most cases). And yes, the word 'overused' is simply daft.

[DJKillaQueen]

Overused means that the volume of traffic at peak times is too much for the junction to run smoothly whatever solution is in place. And I totally agree that the problem is exacerbated by local residential roads being cut off to through use.