Goose Green councillors - how can we help?

[malumbu]

Thank you for a very thorough post. I hope that those more troubled by LTNs take time to read and appreciate your level of detail.

My only thoughts are on the political comments. When I worked more in this area I had he 'pleasure' of seeing the then Tory Mayor a few times. I've posted elsewhere that he was very un-Tory like in his interventions on clean air, and has continued in respect to active travel in his current post as PM. Interesting dichotomy in a Tory government introducing and supporting the concept of LTNs yet Tory boroughs are resisting.

I occasionally get accused of Spamming, as I support efforts to reduce the number of cars on the road and also have a wealth of knowledge on vehicle emissions. But if I was to be a bit of a tease, picking up on the political comments, perhaps those most adverse may wish to consider moving out of Southwark into a Tory borough, no 20mph zone in Bromley I expect.

[Jim1234]

Hi James,

I would love to see the closure of Lordship Lane to traffic. Closing the road has done wonders for Rye Lane.

Jim

[Spartacus]

Jim1234 Wrote:

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

> Hi James,

>

> I would love to see the closure of Lordship Lane

> to traffic. Closing the road has done wonders for

> Rye Lane.

>

> Jim

Talk to the residents and business on Rye Lane to see how disastrous the "wonders" are.

Not forgetting the elderly and disabled who can no longer access Rye Lane by bus so now shop elsewhere...

[Rockets]

Cllr McAsh,

Nor do I think the Tory approach to ripping out LTNs and bike lanes is the right approach. But then again nor do I think the Labour approach in Southwark to LTNs and the amateurish way they have been implemented and the self-serving way you refuse to acknowledge the obvious flaws in the implementation is the right approach. You're both as bad as each other, putting party politics and political ideology ahead of properly addressing the issues.

Maybe one party will take their head out of the sand and come up with a plan that actually delivers.

Despite your claims that 18,000 leaflets have been delivered it is quite shocking how few people have actually received them - if seems the distribution has been, perhaps, deliberately flawed, And I understand that the council is now claiming the lack of and flaws in distribution cannot be rectified due to the rules of campaigning ahead of the Mayoral election. How convenient.

Perhaps you could confirm which streets were on the distribution list and are supposed to have received the leaflets. I have heard that, bar Underhill Road, no-one east of Lordship Lane received them. Why?

Your council is very deliberately trying to influence the outcome of the review by trying to gerrymander and restrict awareness. Either that or the council is utterly incompetent and incapable of executing an area-wide leaflet drop. The fact both Pro and anti-LTN groups are having to fund leaflet drops to draw attention to the review speaks volumes. It is reflective of an electorate having to take matters into their own hands due to the council's failings. And that should be ringing alarm bells within the council.

[Cathann]

I live on Lordship Lane and have never received the leaflet.

[Pugwash]

Close lordship Lane!!!!

Since many shopkeepers and local residents campaigned hard and very vocally to save LL when the Dog Kennel Hill Salisbury's was being built, it is a silly idea to make this vital area into a pedestrianized zone.

Since Rye Lane has been closed, I have to think which shops etc I want to visit as I cannot carry heavy shopping from Primark area up to Heaton Road. Last time I went down the lane, they were doing road works and the bus stop near Peckham Square was closed and I had to walk down to near the Lister HC.

[Peckham Park]

I feel for the difficult decisions Councillors must make. Climate change, accusations of not doing enough, or doing the wrong things. Lobbied from all angles, and never getting it quite right for everyone. However, probably the worst thing they can be accused of in all of this is being called systemically racist. In Lewisham, the legal ramifications of the judgement in the death of Ms Kissi-Debrah?s daughter has led to knee jerk responses by councillors to drive down traffic in South London. Ms Kissi-Debrah is a very admirable woman and a true green campaigner, but she also a pragmatist. Her views on LTNs says a lot, that our local Southwark councillors should reflect on....https://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/18616846.air-quality-voice-rosamund-kissi-debrah-slams-lee-green-ltn/

[malumbu]

That is probably the most absurd thing that I have heard on LTNs. Utter nonsense that Lewisham's LTNs are a knee jerk response to the inquest. Drivers need to think a bit more about air quality in their choice of car, when, where and how to drive. Rather than seek to blame poor air quality on everyone else but them. The most simple example is driving along traffic calmed roads - accelerate to the speed bump, brake, accelerate to the speed bump, break. = Far more emissions. At no benefit to the driver as you get there no quicker and worse, costs you more in fuel and wear and tear. A no brainer that 95+ % don't seem to understand. Of course we wouldn't need traffic calmed roads if drivers were more responsible and aware of speed and road safety. My one significant criticism of local authorities is not enforcing speed limits in particular the 20mph zones - please bring on average speed cameras. In no time at all you would get massive behaviour change and the world would be a better place for it.

[Rockets]

What is more shocking to me is the fact that the LTN debacle is happening under Labour's watch - they seem to have lost leave of their senses and are behaving more like Tories with their head in the sand approach. It demonstrates to me how far they have become separated from the voters and they are seemingly repeating the same mistakes at a local level that led us to have to live under this Tory government for another 4 years - putting far-left ideology and party politics ahead of listening to what voters are saying to them.

[legalalien]

Just had an email about an upcoming Goose Green ward meeting. Thought I'd re-post it here, given I received it (not a GG resident, but when I signed up for website updates I ticked GG I think),

"Hello Goose Green resident,

Join your local councillors in Goose Green, Cllr James McAsh, Cllr Victoria Olisa and Cllr Charlie Smith on Tuesday 11 May for an online ward meeting.

The theme is:

Local High Street

Let?s come together to discuss:

- Supporting our local businesses

- Making our high streets as vibrant and attractive as they can be

- Bringing the East Dulwich community together after a tough year

The meeting starts at 6pm ? 7:30pm and will take place via Zoom.

Pre-registration is required to attend this meeting. Simply visit:

https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYpd-2rrTguH9eHKxmW_zvfCfZ0hv4brgxj and enter your name and email address. You will then receive a confirmation email with the meeting link and passcode.

Hope to see you on the 11 May.

Regards

etc"

[Spartacus]

Thanks legal

Wonder if the traders have been invited?

[Nigello]

One easy way of helping retail is to do a clean up - painting peeling lampposts, railings, cutting back overhanging branches, scrubbing away markings on bus stops, shop fronts, etc. Some of that can be done by the relevant bodies (TfL, etc.) but a fair amount can be done by individuals, such as business owners, tenants etc. It's not an affront to that person to ask him/her to keep their property looking neutral (it doesn't even have to be pretty or attractive, just a bare minimum of clean and tidy). So, if any of this applies to you, please consider doing your bit and carry on doing it to help the area cope as well as it can with the aftermath of the pandemic.

Multi-thousand quid planters are not needed - just a bit of oomph and elbow grease.

[Rockets]

That could be a fun meeting to watch! ;-)

..especially if the traders have been invited.....

Grab your popcorn....

[malumbu]

Hi Nigello, cheers for a constructive post. The Forest Hill Society do a lot of planting in SE23. Does the Dulwich Society or other community group do similar over the border? https://www.foresthillsociety.com/2021/04/town-centre-planting.html

[jamesmcash]

Hi all,

I hope everyone is having a good week and enjoying the first few days of laxer restrictions. I've been working on an e s s a y so not managed to get to a pub or restaurant yet - hopefully soon!

Upcoming community meeting

I've posted about this separately (https://www.eastdulwichforum.co.uk/forum/read.php?5,2201246) but worth repeating:

As you know, this has been a difficult year for local businesses. Our data suggest that 70% of businesses lost over 75% of their revenue in the early months of the pandemic. The council has tried to help plug the gap, issuing over ?12.5million in1500 grants to businesses in the SE22 postcode but we know that in many cases this has not been enough to make up for lost trade.

Now, as restrictions begin to be lifted we want to do everything we can to make our high streets as vibrant and attractive as possible. One business suggested that we host a community meeting with businesses and local residents to discuss how we ? as a council and as a community ? can support our local businesses. So that?s what we?re doing!

Please join us on Tuesday 11 May for an online ward meeting.

The theme is:

Local High Streets

Let?s come together to discuss:

- Supporting our local businesses

- Making our high streets as vibrant and attractive as they can be

- Bringing the East Dulwich community together after a tough year

The meeting starts at 6pm - 7:30pm and will take place via Zoom.

Pre-registration is required to attend this meeting. Simply visit:

https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYpd-2rrTguH9eHKxmW_zvfCfZ0hv4brgxj and enter your name and email address. You will then receive a confirmation email with the meeting link and passcode.

If you have any issues with this, please contact Fitzroy Lewis at [email protected]

We want this meeting to be useful for you. So please let us know in advance if you have ideas that you want to discuss - especially if you are from a local business yourself!

Transport and other sources of emissions

Transport is not the sole source of carbon emissions. The council has shifted all the energy used in its offices, buildings and street lighting to renewable energy. Housing will switch over by September https://www.southwark.gov.uk/news/2021/jan/southwark-takes-strides-towards-sustainable-energy

Newsletter

Every street in Goose Green should have received the newsletter. I'm not sure of the exact streets in other wards but in total it covers 18,000 addresses. Following this thread, it is not true that "no-one east of Lordship Lane received them". In fact, a resident emailed me about this thread to say that they and all their neighbours had received it. They didn't want to post on here because of the toxic atmosphere...

That said, I am sorry if anyone did not receive it.

You can read it here: https://bit.ly/3dnCOZp

And you can sign up for the consultation here: https://www.southwark.gov.uk/news/2021/jan/southwark-takes-strides-towards-sustainable-energy

Best wishes

James

(I edited this half a dozen times because it wouldn't let me post and I couldn't work out why not so I had to put it up in parts. Turns out it was the word e s s a y that caused the problems...

[heartblock]

Thanks James, none of my neighbours in East Dulwich Grove have received a newsletter or a consultation leaflet. Is it possible that this could be remedied in the next few weeks as very few are look at this forum. Many thanks.

[Rockets]

Heartblock - the council cannot remedy it as they are in a blackout period ahead of the mayoral elections.

Cllr McAsh - would you please share with us the list of roads east of Lordship Lane that have received the leaflets? It appears it is a few houses along each road immediately bordering Lordship Lane (literally the first few houses) and then some houses along Underhill Road.

And perhaps you might tell us which road the resident who told you all of their neighbours had received it is - it wouldn't be Melbourne Grove per chance.......asking for a friend....;-)

Finally, are monitoring strips in on Underhill Road?

[Serena2012]

Just to reiterate James, having spoken to people at both ends (village and Lordship Lane) of East Dulwich Grove today, none of us have received the leaflets. I can?t help but think that this is a deliberate attempt by the council to skew the results of the consultation, and not for the first time!

[rupert james]

Rockets Wrote:

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

> Heartblock - the council cannot remedy it as they

> are in a blackout period ahead of the mayoral

> elections.

>

> Cllr McAsh - would you please share with us the

> list of roads east of Lordship Lane that have

> received the leaflets? It appears it is a few

> houses along each road immediately bordering

> Lordship Lane (literally the first few houses) and

> then some houses along Underhill Road.

>

> And perhaps you might tell us which road the

> resident who told you all of their neighbours had

> received it is - it wouldn't be Melbourne Grove

> per chance.......asking for a friend....;-)

>

> Finally, are monitoring strips in on Underhill

> Road?

With regard to monitoring strips on my morning walk I noticed strips on Champion Hill, Why?

The council has blocked of the road. What are they up to? Ex Cllr Barber would you offer an explanation.

[LauraHW]

Dear Cllr McAsh

I'll hold my hands up now and say that you're not my ward councillor: I live in Peckham Rye ward but despite repeated attempts to contact my local councillors on this issue I haven't had a single response or an acknowledgement of my emails so am unclear how to get a answer for my questions. I have also tried signing up to the Council's climate emergency newsletter twice and haven't had a single newsletter. Also apologies for highjacking the thread but I'm just picking up on a something you raised in your post:

"Transport is not the sole source of carbon emissions."

Indeed it is not, I imagine transport contributes less than 15% of Southwark's emissions. The elephant in the room that I've not heard a single mention of from Southwark is about how we are going to tackle the largest source of carbon emissions in the borough which is domestic emissions in the private housing sector in particular heat. A massive, ambitious plan is needed at a local level to address this and I'm not sure I've seen anything from Southwark that acknowledges the scale of what is needed.

Two years since Southwark declared a climate emergency and there's no firm, costed, targeted plan. A draft plan was quietly consulted on last July and now its April. What's been happening since then? Your target is achieving carbon neutrality in eight years? It's not going to happen while the council focuses all its efforts on transport and LTNs. The announcement about a ?101m budget to support carbon reduction was thin on detail and mentioned measures to reduce the emissions from the operational estate but what does this actually contribute to the overall reduction in borough emissions? 2% perhaps? Other councils across the UK are forging ahead and have really got this. Southwark is left behind and its lack of ambition and failure to get to grips with what is needed is shocking and negligent. A few laudable actions have happened like the creation of a DHN using waste heat from SELCHP, but again this covers a tiny proportion of households. And talking about creating planters at the end of closed streets whilst A Good Thing, is window dressing.

Regardless of the inaction and obfuscation, the constant stonewalling of any communications is most frustrating. Especially when achieving net zero will only happen when you actively engage and consult. I know there was a climate change conference last year but how many people actually attended and how was this publicised? What has been done since then to genuinely engage the whole Southwark community?

This isn't going to go away and the consequences for inaction are unthinkable. It's a real cliche but all the effort going into LTN is fiddling while Southwark burns.

Again apologies for highjacking this thread but I literally can't get a response from anyone (officer and Cllr alike) and would really appreciate your thoughts.

Many thanks

[first mate]

Perhaps the Council would have little to gain by going after householders and heating? Car users are a much easier target and can be used to extract cash and if things go wrong or not quite to plan they can blame matters on the current government or the Mayor.

What is your view on infill developments by removing and building on green areas on housing estates?

[LauraHW]

Yeah but if you're going to have a target of net zero for the borough surely you have to have some idea of how you're going to reduce the largest source of carbon emissions? Otherwise don't make bold climate emergency declarations

[legalalien]

Laura, I'm with you.

I emailed to ask who was on last year's climate emergency steering group. No answer. Submitted FoI. No answer. Escalated FoI in accordance with Southwark policy. Twice. No answer, no answer.

So I've complained to the ICO. If the council won't even answer a simple question about who they have been speaking to, the chance of getting more detailed info is, I suspect, zero.

I agree that the council shouldn't have made the declaration / set the target if they don't believe they have sufficient powers to do the things required to achieve it. If they do believe they have sufficient powers, then there should be a plan.

[Penguin68]

Yeah but if you're going to have a target of net zero for the borough

Many years ago Greenwich proudly announced it was a nuclear-free borough. This was grandstanding (as is the above) as it believed, like all the boroughs in London (and indeed any major conurbation in the UK, I believe) that nuclear power stations were always placed on the periphery of the country. In fact, Greenwich had a nuclear power plant (a working submarine nuclear engine in the Queen Mary Building (or King William, I can't remember) of what was then the Old Royal Naval College (now Greenwich University) to train engineers on nuclear subs. So, far from being 'nuclear free', Greenwich was in fact the only 'nuclear' London Borough.

Councils can boast and bluster, but actual delivery which they can control is the only real issue. Greenwich could not control the Armed Services, Southwark can influence, itself, only fraction of the contributors to climate change. To pretend otherwise is simple vanity.

[LauraHW]

Agreed although other councils are making a pretty good stab at it and showing real ambition rather than plant pots and paper straws e.g Hackney, Plymouth, Oxford, Barnsley are some great examples.

https://hackney.gov.uk/hackney-light-and-power

https://www.plymouth.gov.uk/climateemergency/climateemergencyactionplan/powerandheat

https://www.oxford.gov.uk/news/article/1592/oxford_city_council_announces_appointment_of_scientific_advisor

http://www.energisebarnsley.co.uk/about/