Accident Barry Road 2.45pm (May 21)

[SueJ]

Accident on Barry Road junction with Upland Road

Currently very congested 2.45pm

[EDQueen]

Saw the accident myself. Looked pretty bad involving 3 cars. Paramedics were down there checking people over.

[binary_star]

Saw the aftermath of this, it looked nasty, hope no-one was seriously hurt. Couldn't see how the works carried out at this junction were meant to reduce collisions anyway. Seems the obvious answer as many people have suggested is to put traffic calming measures on BARRY RD. Can't understand why tfl are allowed to throw their weight around when this is clearly a rta hotspot. Only a matter of time before someone is killed IMO.

[James Barber]

Hi binary star,

No works have taken place at this junction of Barry Road with Upland Road. In the last three years prior to this collision this junction had zero crashes. A single crash on the adjacent pelican crossing had occurred.

The junction we've had work done on is Barry Road with Underhill Road.

Hope that clears up this misperception.

[binary_star]

Yes you're right, sorry. Think my point still stands about traffic calming measures being put on Barry Rd rather than the side streets. I also think there must be a discrepancy between the number of actual vs reported accidents as we've known of more than were reported at the underhill junction.

[James Barber]

Hi binary star,

I had meant to mention it but yes research has shown that definite discrepancies between actual and officially reported collisions and crashes. But it is extremely hard to extrapolate the level of crashes factoring in the researched under reporting rates by set severity of crash types if literarily none have been reported!

[Jacks50]

I find the problem with barry road is going across it from either upland road or underhill road - you can't see because of the cars parked. you have to pull out to see if anything is coming, and they do come along quite fast.

[Jacks50]

I find the problem with barry road is going across it from either upland or underhill oad - you can't see because of the cars parked. you have to pull out to see if anything is coming, and they do come along quite fast.

[trentk69]

While I am grateful that the council now has addressed the junction of Barry and Underhill roads, I cant see how the work done is going to allieviate the problems.

Granted there has been no crashes on this intersection since the work was completed, but I have heard and witnessed numerous near misses from this junction, with the two main problems being, speed of cars coming down Barry road, and the lack of vision when looking right up Barry road from Underhill road.

I feel the slight elevation that has been added to the Underhill road entry and exit on Barry road has done nothing to improve this situation, and I still think this is a very dangerous intersection.

Perhaps removing the cars on the right hand side of Barry road up from this intersection might be a better option?

Just my 2p worth....

[Pickle]

Agree with you entirely Trentk69. I use this junction daily, and the primary problem is lack of visibility as you look towards the church end of Barry Road. Unfortunately the works done haven't helped this at all.

[jimbo1964]

Agreed. The biggest problem is parked cars or vans blocking the view up and down Barry Road.

[TJ]

I still don't understand why there can't be occasional raised sections on Barry road.

It seems by adding a small raised section of the side road (where people are already coming to a halt)is not the issue.. Its the cars on barry road that also need to be visible. Either by slowing them or clearing line sights.

i find it amazing southwark are avoiding an opportunity to put traffic calming masures on a busy road. Its not like they are usually shy of fannying about with anything and everything...

[Siduhe]

The particular junction between Underhill and Barry Road is not being helped at all at the moment by the building works going on at the old lumber yard. I don't use the junction every day, but my experience is that the builders regularly cone off sections of the road to provide access to delivery vehicles (even at the weekend when they're not working) and/or park up lorries/vans on both Underhill and Barry Road which are difficult to see and manoeuvre around, particularly if you're trying to get across Barry Road. On Saturday morning, they had coned off half of one lane on Underhill Road so that effectively there was only one lane of traffic for both directions which made it really hard to get across Barry Road without heading into oncoming traffic.

I know it's been mentioned before and James was going to ask traffic officers to look at it, but doesn't seem to be any change in their behaviour.

[TonyQuinn]

I have written about the dangers of that junction for years. My anecdote of being woken up at the crack of dawn after a crash left one of them marooned outside of Barry's Supermarket. Imagine if people were there at the time! Now Mr Barber, get your colleagues in the council to do something about Barry Road. I know the Tories and their Libdem stooges in Parliament have taken an axe to council spending but this has gone on long enough, don't you think?

[binary_star]

TJ Wrote:

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

> i find it amazing southwark are avoiding an

> opportunity to put traffic calming masures on a

> busy road. Its not like they are usually shy of

> fannying about with anything and everything...

tfl bus route!

[James Barber]

Hi TonyQuinn,

You have a curious way of engaging people to do your bidding.

The junction of Upland Road with Barry Road in the last 3 years had zero reported collisions and crashes.

So we used that as a template for changes to the Underhill Road with Barry Road junction. So far it appears to have had zero reported crashes or collisions.

Money is supposed to be coming as per the three year plan to improve safety on Barry Road - and the obvious speeding. But how do you reduce the speeding while avoiding mega humps affecting the buses that use Barry Road?

Where humps and have been placed - a la speed table junction Goodrich Road junction with Barry Road neighoburing properties suffer terrible vibrations.

In the past we were hoping that average speed cameras would have been type approved by now but they still haven't been. And frankly if a Labour govt had the heebie jeebies over them then the tory part of the coalition will have a fit at the suggestion that illegal speeding should be contained. BUT I can get a question asked.

I'd welcome constructive ideas.

[Penguin68]

The junction of Upland Road with Barry Road in the last 3 years had zero reported collisions and crashes.

So we used that as a template for changes to the Underhill Road with Barry Road junction. So far it appears to have had zero reported crashes or collisions. - James Barber in post just above

Accident on Barry Road junction with Upland Road

Currently very congested 2.45pm - First post in this thread.

Huh?

[DaveR]

James, I think the problem is that raw accident data may not fully capture the problems with these junctions, and consequently using the Upland Rd junction as a model may not be ideal. Barry Road is unusual - it is a B road and bus route, quite long and straight, but also a residential road that is crossed by a number of other residential roads. I suspect that the pattern of traffic flow would suggest that both of these junctions would be better off being controlled by traffic lights, but the volume of traffic wouldn't justify it. As matters stand, neither junction feels very safe, and the works at Underhill Road won't change that.

[srisky]

I can't understand why tfl would be so opposed to traffic calming measures at Barry/Underhill Rd or Barry/Upland Rd junctions when there is already one (a raised pedistrian crossing which also serves as a speed bump) at Barry/Goodrich Rd...

[Pugwash]

When the raised table was first put in at Goodrich and Barry Junctions as there were a number of crashes at this site, all the buses using the route refused to use Barry Road as it meant that they had to really slow down at this point to avoid bashing the bottom of the bus. I cannot remember how long we were without buses as it was many years ago. Southwark after spending thousands doing the work were forced to lower the speed table or deprive an area of buses.

TFL are a bolshie lot and have quite alot of power. They can also say where traffic lights can be installed on certain major routes. Give TFL less power and people power and local councils may see improvements.

[QueenMab]

I must agree that the junctions (Upland Rd, Underhill Rd) going east across Barry Road are a liability, both as a cyclist and a car driver. Possibly it's worse for car drivers as you don't have the height advantage. I avoid taking these routes if possible. However, for goodness' sake more speed bumps cannot be the answer, they seem to encourage bad driving as you have people swerving all over the place trying to avoid them.

[the-e-dealer]

I cross the Junction by Barrys every day towards Forest Hill. Its scarey!

[binary_star]

"Speed cushions are the preferred vertical measure on bus routes and are acceptable in small numbers when used as part of

a combination of traffic calming measures."

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/businessandpartners/trafficcalmingmeasuresleaflet-rev-final.pdf

ETA: That's a 798kb pdf

[James Barber]

Hi Penguin68,

Yes I appreciate tha the thread was started by a particular collission at Upland/Barry junction.

I also appreciate DaveR that crash data wont be the whole story.

But what else do we use?

At this point it is most likely another crash at upland/Barry Road junction wont happen for several years.

Do we work on this junction at the expense of other junctions with a higher incidence of crashes?

Certainly when the Lib Dems led Southwark Council accident remedial works was based on crash data and we have other junctions with a greater incidence of crashes to fix first. Which was why Underhill Road/Barry Road has had works.

[Penguin68]

My point, James, was that you were praying-in-aid the design of the Barry/ Upland junction as being a model of safety for the Underhill junction in a thread announcing an accident on that very junction. What makes you think that 'at this point' another crash won't happen for several years?

That junction is much less used than Underhill (it isn't a bus route, nor is it really a 2 way through route to/ from anywhere - it's into a route leading to the South Circlar going south, but not travelling from the south heading north). And yet it managed an accident with the new layout and platforms.

Granted that the building works on the corner of Underhill aren't exactly making life any easier, but nothing done to the side roads will slow down Barry traffic (indeed it could even speed it up!) And most people perceive that it is Barry road speeds (and the problems those cause when trying to get into or across the flow of traffic) which seem to precipitate accidents.