Urgent: Help Reopen Closed Melbourne Grove and adjacent roads

[FairTgirl]

Up date to the below;

The time has come if you have not already, and wish to object - to legally object to the East Dulwich Road Closures. TMO2021-EXP10_LSP E Dulwich

(road closures on Derwent Grove, Elsie Road, Melbourne Grove and Tintagel Crescent); and TMO2021-EXP02_LSP Dulwich?and?TMO2021-EXP16_LSP Dulwich 2?(Melbourne Grove South, and closures in Dulwich Village)

Deadline to do so is 19 Feb 2021.

You need to write to: [email protected]@southwark.gov.uk, [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected],

Additional emails to cc in are listed below.

State in Subject line: Official Objection to TMO2021-EXP10_LSP E Dulwich

This is the official objection that Cabinet Member for Roads, Cllr Catherine Rose must legally take into account as part of the review process of these closures.

*Please add your name and address of your home or business to your email.

Grounds for objections can include:

- Blocking 4 well-used and vital access to routes to Kings? College hospital - very worrying emails from London Ambulance Service to Southwark Council emerged yesterday, showing they were appealing to Southwark Council to re-open or amend these closures since September as they, and resultant congestion were risking lives. These emails were ignored. They had been appealing to Southwark Council around other local closures since July 2020.

Link to Telegraph article on this here: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/02/06/road-closures-see-paramedics-struggling-reach-injured-cyclists/

- Increased congestion and pollution on surrounding boundary roads users, residents, businesses and schools, heavy pedestrian routes which many use for passage to school, bus stops, stations

- Impacts of increased pollution and loss of access and parking to local businesses

- Social injustice and discrimination of funnelling all local traffic onto roads with most social housing and BAME residents and lowest car ownership

- Increased environmental damage resulting from idling congested traffic, travelling more vehicle miles

- the lack of traffic and air pollution monitoring prior to and during the implementation, the absence of any conscientious assessment of the risk and extent of adverse impacts on those in protected groups, and the flawed implementation of existing Southwark policy.??

An expanded list of objections are here: https://www.onedulwich.uk/dv-objections

Feel free to copy these objections into your email.

[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]@southwark.gov.uk, [email protected], [email protected],

[email protected], [email protected],

[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

But do send an email if you have any objections.

You can also use this link https://forms.southwark.gov.uk/ShowForm.asp quoting reference ?TMO2021-EXP10_LSP E Dulwich?.

Or write a letter here: Traffic Order consultations, Highways, Southwark Council, Environment and Leisure, P.O. Box 64529, London SE1P 5LX

Background

On Sept 3 Southwark Council closed access to Melbourne Grove from Grove Vale and all the other above mentioned roads, with absolutely NO consultation with the businesses, instantly cutting off passing trade, vehicular access and we have already seen customer footfall drop.

There have been at least three occassions select local residents have been consulted, meetings had and plans shown, businesses that are immediately impacted have been omitted from reports and the process.

The aim appears to be to cut off all cars using these roads except residents, to prevent cars getting across to Dulwich Village this way and to get all traffic to use the more 'main roads' of Grove Vale and East Dulwich. I am parent of primary shcool age children in East Dulwich and totally agree with lowering pollution (especially around schools) but these plans will not actually achieve that, or will for a handful of residents but actually make it worse for the rest of us AND are cutting off trade to businesses that are just trying to get back on their feet post lockdown.

As an East Dulwich local you may have already noticed worse traffic and confusion on Grove Vale and East Dulwich Grove, heavier traffic equals more cars, idling engines, and more pollution on these roads, which include 2 schools, a public library and a new nursery on Grove Vale.

These roads may be considered to be more 'main roads' but are also heavily residential too. Why should the residents and businesses on these roads have to suffer greater pollution? There is social justice aspect to this, the people who tend to live on the busier roads tend to have less expensive housing, why should the value of your street or housing influence the amount of pollution you are exposed to?

Additionally there appears to have been no actual air pollution testing, traffic monitoring or modelling of redirected traffic loads on any of these roads prior to this plan. This 'experiment' could be for a minimum of 18 months. Small independent businesses can die in under 3 months without footfall, less given we are all on shaky ground post lockdown.

May I reiterate that there has been NO consultation of any kind with key stakeholders and this almost definitey will result in higher levels of pollution for the people who walk down, work and live on these roads. Do you walk to East Dulwich Station, down Grove Vale? You will be breathing in higher levels of pollution than you were last week.

This is an hugely ill conceived plan, with very little thought behind it, no nuance, no exploration of options, or any discussion with the local community.

Even if you are not interested in supporting local businesses, or worried about air pollution, you will find your journeys disrupted and taking longer, perhaps you are a local tradesman who needs to use these roads to get around and suddenly your journey times are tripled? Perhaps you just disagree with the unjust and sketchy methods the council are using to implement these road closures. Councils are dropping these all over London with NO consultation, using Co-vid as some kind of reasoning for not having to consider any local residents or businesses opinions, the impact on them, or your health.

If you support any of these issues please sign our online petition, and email your local councillors to express your views. You can also express your views on the specific road closures via an app I have copied in below.

Signing the petition is NOT saying 'I want rat runs between East Dulwich and Dulwich Village'

It is NOT saying 'I don't care about traffic or air pollution'

It IS saying, 'I want a proper discussion with key parties on how this is done'

It IS saying 'I want joined up thinking and solutions that work for most'

It IS saying, 'I want clearer air for all, not just a few'

Please show us your support if you can. There are peoples livelihoods and health at stake.

Please Follow us on twitter @GroveReopen and please retweet our tweets to any local journalists

You can also voice your views here

Streetspace East Dulwich : https://eastdulwichstreetspace.commonplace.is/?utm_campaign=sharing-project-on-WhatsApp&utm_medium=social&utm_source=WhatsApp

[tiddles]

Signed. Thanks for the list of emails

[SpringTime]

Signed. Good luck.

[FairTgirl]

Thank you

[Abe_froeman]

Huge sympathies to you and I hope for your business that they knock this idiotic scheme on the head in very short order.

[FairTgirl]

Thankyou very much. Please do sign our petition and register your opinion here

Streetspace East Dulwich : [eastdulwichstreetspace.commonplace.is]

[ed26]

I would rarely drive to a business on Melbourne Grove, but I wouldn't know about the businesses if I hadn't driven past them at some point. This is a real Ivory Tower decision that has been made without any thought of the knock-on effects on any other road restriction. One more road restirction around here and we'll all be stuck in an infinite loop, never able to get out of or back to our homes again.

[Siduhe]

It's also odd in the context of the very quick action that the Council has taken on Rye Lane to manage the adverse impact on the businesses there.

Having closed the Lane to all motorised traffic, it is now open early morning and in the evening to allow for deliveries (but not to buses, which is still having a massive knock on impact on those businesses). This change was implemented within two weeks of the closure being announced and yes it makes it much less pleasant to use as a pedestrian and cyclist at those times, but it's a reasonable balance of use for those businesses.

[TheCropolite]

The funny thing with traffic is it often gets bad shortly after road/lane closures and then gets better as people realise that the journeys they previously used to take end up taking too long for them to be worth it and use quicker modes of transport.

Some reading material for you:

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/londonlivingstreets.com/2019/07/11/evaporating-traffic-impact-of-low-traffic-neighbourhoods-on-main-roads/amp/

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braess%27s_paradox

https://www.rapidtransition.org/stories/reducing-roads-can-cause-traffic-to-evaporate/

FYI the people who make these decisions are civil engineers, with many other checks and balances. Its not like some jobsworth who has nothing better to do thought let?s close a few roads to wind everyone up. In regards to lack of consultation that is a shame, however had they done a consultation and explained to you that closing roads can actually reduce traffic and car use in the long run would you take that into consideration?

I would give it some time to see if it does work in reducing traffic in the coming weeks/months.

[Rockets]

Please, please stop quoting from two decade old reports - it appears to be the go-to "proof" that this is going to magically fix everything.

It won't. And here is why and I am going to, somewhat hypocritically, quote from one of the two decade old reports you linked to to illustrate the point...;-)

It says:

In half of the case studies, there was a 11% reduction in number of vehicles across the whole area where roadspace for traffic was reduced, including the main roads.

11% - that scarily low magic number that makes you ponder what happens to the other 89% of traffic that used to use those routes......and the residents of Lordship Lane, East Dulwich Grove and anyone trying to use the A205 can probabyl give you a clue where it has gone and will continue to go....

And remember the trials like the oft heralded Waltham Forest were isolated, one area doing it which meant cars just went a different way. If you click through to the Waltham Forest report you will see that traffic increased massively on surrounding roads during the initial trial (up by as much as 158% in some cases) and then continued to register much greater traffic numbers after the full works were done.

Can the streets around Dulwich absorb huge increases in traffic flow because of the closures - has the council even modelled this?

[FairTgirl]

Traffic will understandably spike initially and it may drop back a bit from that intial spike, but there will continue to be higher levels of traffic on the surrounding roads as drivers have no other roads to choose.

People do not change driving habits of a lifetime overnight and perhaps some much bigger thinking is required around car use fullstop.

But these roads closures will not achieve these aims and will immediately make the air pollution on the roads running alongside schools, already illegally high around Goose Green school, even higher.

These road closures went in the day many Primary schools went back. So the first days the children were back at school since March, walking to school and using the playground, they were experiencing higher levels of pollution.

I don't know how long people think is an acceptable time to have illegally high levels of pollution around schools? Or how long businesses that had no say in this should suffer lower income and disruption? The owners of the businesess are all locals too, all using these roads as pedestrians, cyclists and drivers, and we have children at local schools.

With no consultation, no new studies, no new data, Southwark Council is doing a disservice to us all. With some real consultation new options, new ideas, innovation and compromise might be reached.

[Penguin68]

It is worth saying (again) that levels of pollution generally in London have dropped dramatically over recent years, and would have dropped further with the extension of the ULEZ. This is based on better engineered petrol and diesel engines. Add to that the impact of hybrid and wholly electric vehicles and vehicle-created pollution (in normal times) is already reduced and will reduce much further. In the short term, however, forcing standing traffic into narrow suburban 'highways' - many not much wider than the roads closed - will add to local pollution.

Southwark wishes to force 50% of cars out of their borough (they're on record for that) - which is fine for the flat, well served by public transport northern end (the original Southwark) - which is also closer to the centre of London for those wanting to walk or cycle - but fairly dreadful for the hilly, poorly served by public transport Old Camberwell end - also much further from places in Town you might want to get to.

But does Tooley St. or their apparat care about those differences? - not when they can continue to soak us suckers for parking fees and so on.

And now we don't even get a say (hijacking Tory legislation)... - well we do get a say - but only one day every 3 years (or longer when they can extend the vote because of a pandemic).

[TheCropolite]

I would be gobsmacked if the council has not already produced models to determine the dynamics in traffic flow based on these road closures. There are also plenty of other examples of using similar mechanisms to reduce traffic flow however im sure you can find these on google (most of which are not decades old by the way).

The problem is what is the solution to reducing car usage in Southwark and across London? Higher vehicle taxes? Car lotteries? Only drivers with a certain license plate on certain days? More public transport? At some point people are going to have to realise driving your car everywhere is insane and is killing our children and the planet.

[TheCropolite]

I do completely agree with your point that we do need consultation/open forums between residents and the council to get the best situation for everyone, however ultimately this boils down to one thing: too many cars on the road and no one wants to stop.

[spider69]

Too many people producing too many children who grow up wanting motor cars.

Stop people having children and their offspring will not want motorcars.

We can all go back to living as serfs under a feudal lord with our own little plot of land.

Problem solved. Apart from the Lord everyone equal.

[thebestnameshavegone]

We need to have fewer car trips in London. It?s really simple. You?re either pro low traffic stuff. Or you?re pro more car congestion.

[tiddles]

It?s not that cut and dried I think.

[Rockets]

thebestnameshavegone Wrote:

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> We need to have fewer car trips in London. It?s

> really simple. You?re either pro low traffic

> stuff. Or you?re pro more car congestion.

Well it looks like the pro-low traffic lobby are actually creating more congestion. Go figure.....

Are people not allowed to acknowledge that there needs to be fewer car journeys in London but not agree with the cack-handed way the council is going about it?

[Abe_froeman]

We might as well go back to feudalism if everyone has to get around on foot, or if they're very wealthy by donkey, as the wind-back-progress tea party people of dulwich would have it.

[FairTgirl]

Totally agree, we can all have the same aim and surely everyone agrees that less traffic and lower pollution is a positive and achieveable aim, but we need to do it in a more clever nuanced way than this. With consultation.

If Southwark have models and reports let's see them. Publish them, here and on their websites and in local papers for us all to peruse and see the data for ourselves.

And sorry to say TheCropolite, I don't think any thought HAS gone into this. They have already had to remove one of planters today end of Mellbourne Grove/Grove Vale as emergency vehicles can't get through. The 'thinking' did not even extend to emergency vehicles access.

[TheCropolite]

I think you?re still not getting it. There are too many car trips in London, plain and simple. Data from TFL shows that 35% of car trips are under 2km.

http://content.tfl.gov.uk/technical-note-14-who-travels-by-car-in-london.pdf

That?s under 30 mins walking or 10 mins by bike. In London most of those 1-2km trips will be quicker by bike or scooter etc. anyway. Some people may need a car for transporting goods, fine. But most (around 60%) of those trips are also being made by single individuals with no passengers.

This government is not going to introduce sweeping legislation to stem car use in London which I?m not going to get into but if everyone who was making those 1-2km trips by car stopped we would have 35% less cars on the road which is a huge number, which would also improve journey times for those making longer trips or who really need to.

You may think what they?re doing is stupid and is not going to do anything, but I think in hindsight you?ll hopefully realise that any measures to reduce car use are good, and this is one such measure.

[tiddles]

Rockets - spot on

[FairTgirl]

TheCropolite, it may surprise you but as I run an eco shop I too want to limit car use. Personally I walk everywhere and barely use a car but a governing body needs to talk to the people affected before you put in bollards that are going to have an immediate impact on their livelihoods. And have some plans for the immediate increased pollution on the surrounding roads.

I don't think 'you'll be greatful in years to come' is an adequate argument for immediate dangerous spikes in pollution around schools and total disregard for the businesses that operate from those roads.

[TheCropolite]

tiddles Wrote:

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> Rockets - spot on

You do realise this is what happens when you close roads/lanes? There is an initial period where congestion increases before it decreases. Google it.

[Rockets]

TheCropolite Wrote:

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

> tiddles Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > Rockets - spot on

>

>

> You do realise this is what happens when you close

> roads/lanes? There is an initial period where

> congestion increases before it decreases. Google

> it.

11% overall...Google it.....oh you don't need to it was in the links you sent earlier....in fact, if you had bothered to read the document links you sent you will see that in Waltham Forest there was a significant net increase in traffic on the roads not closed and this did not go down.

Can the other roads in East Dulwich accommodate the remaining 89% of traffic? Dulwich Village has 7,000 car journeys per day through the Calton junction (the council's own numbers) - let's be very generous and say 1,000 of those journeys are then made by other means - are you sure the other roads that are not closed can accommodate another 6,000 car movements per day?

And that is just one junction. Then throw in the other changes going in on Melbourne Grove, Townley etc and you have a huge amount of traffic being forcibly funnelled down roads like Lordship Lane and East Dulwich Grove.

Do you see the problem a lot of us are concerned about - this isn't sovling a problem it's creating a much bigger one? It's classic traffic evaporation, it condenses and falls somewhere else.