Forum topic: Plans for Fox Lane low-traffic neighbourhood published

In looking further at traffic evaporation I found some Freedom of Information data which actually has some real data and seems to back up the phenomenon. Before Hammersmith Bridge was closed to cars, 25,000 of them crossed it every day. Since it was closed, the total increase in traffic over Kew, Chiswick, Putney, Wandsworth and Battersea bridges is 15,500. So it appears that around 9,500 car journeys a day have "evaporated".

Estimated average daily (24 hour) traffic flow changes since the bridge closure based on automatic (motorised) traffic counters show only the following rises in nearby traffic routes.
Key Bridge – additional 2,000 cars over the prior daily average
Great West Road – additional 1,000 cars over the prior daily average
Chiswick Bridge – additional 6,500 cars over the prior daily average
Mortlake Road – additional 1,500 cars over the prior daily average
Chalkers Corner – additional 8,000 cars over the prior daily average
Battersea Bridge – additional 1,000 cars over the prior daily average
Fulham Palace Road – additional 3,000 cars over the prior daily average
Putney Bridge – additional 4,000 cars over the prior daily average
Upper Richmond Road – additional 1,600 cars over the prior daily average
Wandsworth Bridge – additional 2,000 cars over the prior daily average
Roehampton Lane – 5,000 LESS cars over the prior daily average

There was an increase in miles driven per journey but these were relatively minimal (ranging from no difference to 12.7 miles) and would be expected as drivers try to find a way around the closed area.
The bridge closure has led to more vehicles through the Chalkers Corner intersection, and delay to vehicles has increased but TfL is changing traffic signal timings to balance these new traffic conditions and manage the delay and so this will probably solve the problem.

What is a little disturbing to me (as I mainly use the bus) is that bus journey times have risen a bit. Average changes in weekday bus journey times (in minutes per km), between 07:00 and 19:00, since the bridge closure based on iBus data and depending on route of course, between a few seconds and 21 minutes. It may be worth pushing the council into installing some dedicated bus lanes. They did that with cycle lane and many more people use buses than cycle.

The FoI data can be found here for those interested:
www.hammersmithbridge.org.uk/Uploads/2019-08-22-0850-FOI%201103%201920.pdf

In one sense it might be said that every issue on this thread has been covered until the Council comes forward with a revised plan for the Lakes Estate, but I think that a few points need further explanation/elaboration. For example cars are wonderfully adaptable and useful, but that adaptability has led people to use them when there are better alternatives.

And that is the sort of point the Council would have had in their minds when it went for cycle lanes. Firstly 'bikes' don't require consumption of finite resources nor do they create harmful emissions, and secondly government at every level is worrying about the alarming lack of exercise of most our culture - cycling is often strenuous without putting damaging strain on the body.

Then there's the question of space, cars are big and fast and therefore especially greedy of space, and furthermore they are often driver-only; one person needing so much space. That was, and still is, a key point.

The claim that the cycle lanes are not much used is often raised and is particularly irritating. I'm 82 years old, and grew up in a small town with a substantial factory. The vast majority of the workforce cycled to work, but then came affluence and over a very short period workers began to arrive by car.........and of course used their car for pleasure and holidays. Put bluntly cycling culture almost died, and my guess is that this happened across the land. Now government, national and local, has to build it back and it will take time. And remember that need to encourage exercise in an under-exercised society.

Roger Dougall in particular sees the cycle lanes as a waste of money. He is entitled to his view, but he should remember that the Government provided most of the money, that the mayor of London distributed the Government money to three councils and that various medical organisations were/are pressing for more exercise.

Cars are wonderfully adaptable, which must be one of the reasons why they are so popular, but they have their downsides: killers in some circumstances, emitting dangerous emissions from engines - until electric cars take over - and tyres, greedy for space. Much of which is reflected in the difficulty of designing the Lakes Estate Quieter Neighbourhood. I wish the Council well in finding good solutions.

That's a powerful video message.
In a previous post i mentioned a petition and accompanying report developed by my own street. Thta was in 2011 and included not dissimilar research, this time from Chicago. (The URL reference is at the end although no longer seems to be active.)

Fortunately, and finally, we seem to be moving right into the sort of corrective actions both sets of data sugget as being imperative. Looking back, the suggestions we made, outrageous at the time, now appear tame.

If we draw on research from Chicago USA:
• In round numbers traffic volumes of less than 1,000 vehicles per day on residential streets are tolerated and cause few complaints;
• As volume rises to between 1,000 and 2,000 vehicles per day, complaints become more common;
• Volumes above 2,000 vehicles per day are not well tolerated and are likely to spur the community to seek remedies; while
• As traffic volumes increase, some streets are pushed beyond this tolerance threshold and as a result the neighbourhood looks for traffic controls to deal with the problem.
_______
We would additionally urge the Council to consider developing a more general Policy based on the broad figures used from Chicago highlighted in section 2 whereby:
• Residential streets seeing between 1000 and 2000 through trips per day are included on a data base and marked for on-going monitoring
• Residential streets seeing between 2000 and 3000 through trips per day are deemed as being unsatisfactory and subject to a stated desire to actually improve the situation
• Residential streets seeing above 3000 through trips per day are stated to be in need of priority improvement, subject to an annual submission to an appropriate Scrutiny Panel and their residents regularly notified of the Councils on-going acknowledgement of the unsatisfactory local circumstance and progress to alleviate.
Such a proactive stance seems appropriate with all related metrics, such as vehicle numbers, pollution, global warming, the health benefits of more walking and such all coming under increasing national scrutiny, and other than actual traffic casualties and some GLA large vehicle emission zone activity, tending to be moving in an adverse direction.
www.ite.org/traffic/documents/AHA97F18.pdf

Yesterday I heard of a landlord complaining about the proposed Fox Lane LTN because it would mean a big detour for his Caversham Avenue tenants driving their kids to Broomfield Park.
Caversham to the park is 5 minutes on foot. Who drives kids that far?
Even if a medical condition necessitated driving, the detour would involve an extra 100-150m on Fox Lane and the same on Aldermans Hill. That’s 300m top whack, in a car.
I’m worrying that common sense has been totally ditched in a race to be angry with this proposal.

Karl B's latest contribution to this post reminds me of a circumstance in my late teenage; I may have told the story on this site before, and if so I apologise . On the other hand it is relevant to this thread.

I had a friend who lived in a house with a longish gravel drive to the road where there was a post box near the entrance gate. He and other family members parked their car by the front door, and if they had a letter to post they would drive to the entrance, reversing back to the front door afterwards. And in my time I've been a neighbour to people who never left the house without getting into their car - Karl's story doesn't surprise me at all.

These are hard habits to break; there will be people who resent walking because they never do it. It's no wonder people are resenting change.

David, Its not arbitrary resistance to change. Please don't misunderstand that the considerable resistnace to the scheme is due to laziness or arrogance per your examples. The majority of people resisting the proposals are mainly doing so because they have to drive in their daily lives for a range of reasons (both parents work and schools far away, elderly, disabled, poor bus services etc). For those of us who have to drive on a daily basis, the proposals risk making us a bigger part of the environmental problem than we already are by forcing much longer journeys in already congested streets. As environmentalists with young asthmatic children this is heartbreaking. Even my 6 year old has pointed out that our longer journeys to school will be bad for the environment. And, no, cycling with them both attached to my bicycle on a round trip of 6 miles when both parents work is not an option. And yes, they are too young for the buses by themselves. Please show some respect and understanding for the MANY who are troubled by the proposals.

A point well put by David Berkovitch. A vast majority of us need to drive on a daily basis.
Still yet to see a post by anybody who works or has a young family who is pro this scheme.