Brixton Liveable Neighbourhood and LTN schemes - improvements for pedestrians and cyclists

[Southlondon]

I think you misunderstood me. I didn't say that no-one should be allowed to drive a car - rather that when someone had to option and ability to use a non car form of transport, they could think about this instead and use the car only when it is necessary.
I'm sure many people would love to live in the countryside, where is there is pretty much zero public transport and a car is an essential. However, for the majority I would imagine, they have to be in or near a city for work. Why should they and their children be penalised for this and expected to put up with unnecessary traffic, accidents and pollution?

I wouldn’t have thought of Medway as countryside, it’s commuter belt now and a lot of ordinary Working people live there and work in London. it’s hard to rent a family home in London on average wages it’s more affordable there, and For first time buyers it was until recently just about affordable to still buy a 2bed terrace house on a modest income.
I don’t think bricklayer enjoys living that far out from their work it’s generally because it’s all they can afford or there’s no work out There so locals have to travel in. Either way don’t assume everyonr commuting into London is a stockbroker , they’re tradesmen, nurses, tube workers etc. A lot of people do it out of necessity and maybe at lest recognise you are asking a lot of exploited ordinary working class people To just roll over and accept not just a longer working day, but increased risk of Covid by expecting them to crowd onto our substandard public transport. Thetr need to effective alternatives put in place

 

[co-op]

You are obsessed by house prices. Is it that you own a house and are worried that you can’t sell, lowers the price or what? I don’t own my house and frankly if you own your house in poets corner, it’s fairly academic if a LTN puts the prices up as they are our of reach of most people anyway

Loose Meat; Total posts on U75, 109. Posts on the Brixton LTN thread 107.

Meh.

They're only here for the trolling. Desperately trying to prove that cars are a rich-poor issue and that the poor support and benefit from cars - that's a pretty tough gig. You can see why s/he prefers talking about house prices. Not sure if they've noticed that practically no one on the Brixton forum owns a house in an LTN - leastways not that I've picked up in the last 15 years on here.

 

[co-op]

Either way don’t assume everyonr commuting into London is a stockbroker , they’re tradesmen, nurses, tube workers etc. A lot of people do it out of necessity and maybe at lest recognise you are asking a lot of exploited ordinary working class people To just roll over and accept not just a longer working day, but increased risk of Covid by expecting them to crowd onto our substandard public transport. Thetr need to effective alternatives put in place

Who's assuming that the only people who commute into London are stockbrokers? Anyone who's ever worked or lived in London knows that people in all walks of life commute from all over the south east to work in London. We all know this and we know it's stupid for multiple reasons, none of which we can do anything about.

But what's your proposal for people wanting to drive in because of covid? Build new roads in London? Reintroduce the 60s plan for Brixton, motorways down Coldharbour Lane, down South Lambeth Rd?

Road-building will not get rid of traffic jams, so anyone who chooses to, or has to, drive will still have a longer working day, goes with working in London, get used to it. Any fantasy that the car will solve any transport issues in London, except possibly for shift workers in the middle of the night is just that; a fantasy.

 

[newbie]

You actually allow people to choose to cycle or to walk. This - for many - is currently barely an option. The commonest single reason for not cycling, or not letting your child cycle is "it's too dangerous". And even for the most serious advocate of building a greener, healthier, more congenial city, it's pretty hard to argue that's not true.

It's not the backstreets that are too dangerous, it's the main roads. The backstreets, whether part of an LTN or not, have always been comparatively safe. Can you produce stats showing otherwise?

People keep talking about LTNs - in a linked network - making cycling safer, like there's some magic way to get from one to the next without using the main roads and the main pinchpoint junctions. Especially as the vast majority of journeys which begin and end somewhere outside an LTN.

It's twaddle. Potentially dangerous twaddle and new cyclists who've been seduced into believing it during lockdown will get hurt if they're not properly on the case as the evenings draw in and the weather gets worse. Encouraging people to cycle without providing proper training or any safety advice strikes me as grossly irresponsible.

I'm all in favour of marked up Quiet Routes and so on, but realistically they are icing on cake. Getting from eg the West End to Brixton can be done mostly on backroads but not one route doesn't involve a bridge with a difficult and dangerous junction at each end, plus one or more major junctions this side of the river. That's where people get hurt, including very experienced cyclists.

So IMO they're right to say "it's too dangerous" (even when that isn't a convenient excuse).

 

[wurlycurly]

It's not the backstreets that are too dangerous, it's the main roads. The backstreets, whether part of an LTN or not, have always been comparatively safe. Can you produce stats showing otherwise?

People keep talking about LTNs - in a linked network - making cycling safer, like there's some magic way to get from one to the next without using the main roads and the main pinchpoint junctions. Especially as the vast majority of journeys which begin and end somewhere outside an LTN.

It's twaddle. Potentially dangerous twaddle and new cyclists who've been seduced into believing it during lockdown will get hurt if they're not properly on the case as the evenings draw in and the weather gets worse. Encouraging people to cycle without providing proper training or any safety advice strikes me as grossly irresponsible.

I'm all in favour of marked up Quiet Routes and so on, but realistically they are icing on cake. Getting from eg the West End to Brixton can be done mostly on backroads but not one route doesn't involve a bridge with a difficult and dangerous junction at each end, plus one or more major junctions this side of the river. That's where people get hurt, including very experienced cyclists.

So IMO they're right to say "it's too dangerous" (even when that isn't a convenient excuse).

I strongly agree with this. I fell for the 'new safe cycling" spiel and bought a second-hand bike. The reality is much different. I do back streets and then walk with my bike on the pavement when things get scary. Not a great look but some junctions etc are frightening for a novice.

 

[wurlycurly]

Double post

 

[Winot]

Getting from eg the West End to Brixton can be done mostly on backroads but not one route doesn't involve a bridge with a difficult and dangerous junction at each end, plus one or more major junctions this side of the river. That's where people get hurt, including very experienced cyclists.

The Oval LTN provides a safe link from the Larkhall Rise Quietway to Harleyford Rd. From there you can cycle on segregated/quiet routes all the way to Marble Arch. Vauxhall Bridge is safe and segregated. No dangerous junctions.

The Ferndale LTN almost reaches the Larkhall Rise Quietway, although there is a nasty bit around Clapham North where an inexperienced cyclist might want to push. My 12 year-old can manage it however.

 

[Winot]

Good summary on BBC

Low Traffic Neighbourhoods: Anger, hate and the politics of the planter

It is difficult to remember transport schemes attracting such vitriol as Low Traffic Neighbourhoods.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[sparkybird]

It's not the backstreets that are too dangerous, it's the main roads. The backstreets, whether part of an LTN or not, have always been comparatively safe. Can you produce stats showing otherwise?

My neighbours did a traffic count last year on our backstreets which showed almost 10,000 vehicles a day on some streets. That's not quiet by any stretch of the imagination. I would say a good 25% of cyclists use the pavements, which aren't wide.

 

[sparkybird]

I wouldn’t have thought of Medway as countryside, it’s commuter belt now and a lot of ordinary Working people live there and work in London. it’s hard to rent a family home in London on average wages it’s more affordable there, and For first time buyers it was until recently just about affordable to still buy a 2bed terrace house on a modest income.
I don’t think bricklayer enjoys living that far out from their work it’s generally because it’s all they can afford or there’s no work out There so locals have to travel in. Either way don’t assume everyonr commuting into London is a stockbroker , they’re tradesmen, nurses, tube workers etc. A lot of people do it out of necessity and maybe at lest recognise you are asking a lot of exploited ordinary working class people To just roll over and accept not just a longer working day, but increased risk of Covid by expecting them to crowd onto our substandard public transport. Thetr need to effective alternatives put in place

I'm not entirely sure how you went from village life and traffic free streets in the countryside to Medway and stockbrokers?

But I'm genuinely interested to learn what your suggestions for effective alternatives are? More cars? More roads? More parking?

 

[newbie]

The Oval LTN provides a safe link from the Larkhall Rise Quietway to Harleyford Rd. From there you can cycle on segregated/quiet routes all the way to Marble Arch. Vauxhall Bridge is safe and segregated. No dangerous junctions.

The Ferndale LTN almost reaches the Larkhall Rise Quietway, although there is a nasty bit around Clapham North where an inexperienced cyclist might want to push. My 12 year-old can manage it however.

View attachment 230647

I'm not sure what you've used to produce that route, since I can't coerce Maps or CityMapper to offer it (and that's ignoring that Marble Arch isn't even on that map ). The cycle routes at the south end of Vauxhall Bridge involve crossing roads, crossing each other and mixing with pedestrians on pavements and at all the lights controlled crossings. They're not, imo, particularly good and while I'll use them in preference to arguing with the traffic, in general I avoid that bridge completely. From there I'm being told to go straight along Wandsworth Road past Sainsburys, which is pretty horrid, take the cobbles at Wilcox, dogleg across fastish traffic on Lansdowne onto the equally fast bit of Larkhall Lane, then wriggle to the awful Gauden Road junction where I'm supposed to cross the traffic and head up Clapham High St to Aristotle in order to dogleg across Bedford onto Sandmere and then cross Acre Lane where there are no lights.

Your route is slightly better I agree, and I suppose you're welcome to describe it as lovely but it's not really, not in any meaningful sense of the word. There are too many sections of main road which are now even more seething with frustrated drivers closing gaps and being impatient.

Whether or not a few backstreets have even less traffic now than they did this time last year is of almost no consequence. What matters is the traffic on the main through routes and it is impossible to avoid that..

 

[sleaterkinney]

It's not the backstreets that are too dangerous, it's the main roads. The backstreets, whether part of an LTN or not, have always been comparatively safe. Can you produce stats showing otherwise?

People keep talking about LTNs - in a linked network - making cycling safer, like there's some magic way to get from one to the next without using the main roads and the main pinchpoint junctions. Especially as the vast majority of journeys which begin and end somewhere outside an LTN.

It's twaddle. Potentially dangerous twaddle and new cyclists who've been seduced into believing it during lockdown will get hurt if they're not properly on the case as the evenings draw in and the weather gets worse. Encouraging people to cycle without providing proper training or any safety advice strikes me as grossly irresponsible.

I'm all in favour of marked up Quiet Routes and so on, but realistically they are icing on cake. Getting from eg the West End to Brixton can be done mostly on backroads but not one route doesn't involve a bridge with a difficult and dangerous junction at each end, plus one or more major junctions this side of the river. That's where people get hurt, including very experienced cyclists.

So IMO they're right to say "it's too dangerous" (even when that isn't a convenient excuse).

Railton road was definitely dangerous, so much so that I wouldn't cycle down it if I could - and I go on A roads sometimes.

 

[newbie]

My neighbours did a traffic count last year on our backstreets which showed almost 10,000 vehicles a day on some streets. That's not quiet by any stretch of the imagination. I would say a good 25% of cyclists use the pavements, which aren't wide.

10 per minute over an 18 hour day on a backstreet? How many were on the ones that weren't thoroughfares?

 

[co-op]

But I'm genuinely interested to learn what your suggestions for effective alternatives are? More cars? More roads? More parking?

^^This. I keep asking, should we resurrect the motorway plans of the 60s and increase capacity? Does anyone believe even for a minute that this will solve the problem - given that it's never succeeded anywhere in the world for the nigh on 100 years that planners have been trying it. All we've got from that is blighted urban spaces, bad health, noise, death, and traffic jams.

But no answer.

So what's the vision people? How do we deal with the transport issue and keep cars at the centre? What's the plan?

 

[Winot]

I'm not sure what you've used to produce that route, since I can't coerce Maps or CityMapper to offer it (and that's ignoring that Marble Arch isn't even on that map ). The cycle routes at the south end of Vauxhall Bridge involve crossing roads, crossing each other and mixing with pedestrians on pavements and at all the lights controlled crossings. They're not, imo, particularly good and while I'll use them in preference to arguing with the traffic, in general I avoid that bridge completely. From there I'm being told to go straight along Wandsworth Road past Sainsburys, which is pretty horrid, take the cobbles at Wilcox, dogleg across fastish traffic on Lansdowne onto the equally fast bit of Larkhall Lane, then wriggle to the awful Gauden Road junction where I'm supposed to cross the traffic and head up Clapham High St to Aristotle in order to dogleg across Bedford onto Sandmere and then cross Acre Lane where there are no lights.

Your route is slightly better I agree, and I suppose you're welcome to describe it as lovely but it's not really, not in any meaningful sense of the word. There are too many sections of main road which are now even more seething with frustrated drivers closing gaps and being impatient.

Whether or not a few backstreets have even less traffic now than they did this time last year is of almost no consequence. What matters is the traffic on the main through routes and it is impossible to avoid that..

I'm sorry that you don't feel safe on that route, but getting rid of LTNs will make that worse not better.

I'd be happy to cycle the route with you from Brixton with a beer/cuppa at either end. How about it?

[The map was an old one I happened to have saved on my phone (I prepared it myself). It goes to the bottom corner of St James' Park - to get to Marble Arch there are segregated cycle routes along the south of St James' to Buck House then along the south of Green Park to Hyde Park Corner. There are then two options - the cycle route through HP or the new segregated route up Park Lane to Marble Arch.]

 

[newbie]

Railton road was definitely dangerous, so much so that I wouldn't cycle down it if I could - and I go on A roads sometimes.

Sure. I don't use it much but I hope it's improved for cyclists, there has to be some positives from all this. My point however, is that in itself it's not much use except for a few very local trips. For most journeys you'll have to contend with the snarling, dangerous mess at each end, which is where the real dangers are.

 

[co-op]

It's not the backstreets that are too dangerous, it's the main roads. The backstreets, whether part of an LTN or not, have always been comparatively safe. Can you produce stats showing otherwise?

People keep talking about LTNs - in a linked network - making cycling safer, like there's some magic way to get from one to the next without using the main roads and the main pinchpoint junctions. Especially as the vast majority of journeys which begin and end somewhere outside an LTN.

It's twaddle. Potentially dangerous twaddle and new cyclists who've been seduced into believing it during lockdown will get hurt if they're not properly on the case as the evenings draw in and the weather gets worse. Encouraging people to cycle without providing proper training or any safety advice strikes me as grossly irresponsible.

I'm all in favour of marked up Quiet Routes and so on, but realistically they are icing on cake. Getting from eg the West End to Brixton can be done mostly on backroads but not one route doesn't involve a bridge with a difficult and dangerous junction at each end, plus one or more major junctions this side of the river. That's where people get hurt, including very experienced cyclists.

So IMO they're right to say "it's too dangerous" (even when that isn't a convenient excuse).

So much nonsense on this thread; my favourite up until now is that reducing car use and dependence will be bad for air quality (cars are so good for our air aren't they!), although "it's the poor who will be hardest hit" is a good 'un (because we all know how powerful the poor are, and how their interests are defended to the hilt, and it's a no-brainer that expensive, capital intensive things like car-ownership are massively concentrated amongst poor people ) but I think you might have found another classic; reducing car use and dependence and making car free travel zones is making life more dangerous for cyclists - Won't someone think of the cyclists?!

I think there might be a logic problem here somewhere too - if LTNs only happen in places which are so safe, then presumably that's because there are hardly any cars so they should have basically no impact on traffic - or hang on, they are a critical part of the car road network and closing leads to chaos, chaos I tells ya, - erm in which case they aren't safe for cyclists - oh whatever, logic's got nothing to do with this has it?

All I can say is that if you think roads like Railton Rd or Shakespeare Rd are in any meaningful way "safe" for cyclists then you literally haven't got a clue. Narrow backstreets and rat-runners are some of the most unpleasant and potentially aggressive encounters between cyclists and drivers, experienced cyclists will use any road but there's no way we're going to encourage any one onto bikes if it involves playing chicken with rat-runners, let alone get children cycling to school etc. It's pure bullshit to argue otherwise.

The UK has the lowest cycling rate of any northern European country - that's because the car has been given priority at every stage. If you give even half a shit about anything from climate change to social justice to basic quality of urban life it's the only way to go. Yet always this shrill chorus of squawking and wailing when anything is done. It's pathetic.

 

[thebackrow]

[/QUOTE]

The Oval LTN provides a safe link from the Larkhall Rise Quietway to Harleyford Rd. From there you can cycle on segregated/quiet routes all the way to Marble Arch. Vauxhall Bridge is safe and segregated. No dangerous junctions.

Plus of course if you carry on with QW5 it takes you over to Baylis Road. The Cut is meant to be closed to through traffic soon which means you link to the segregated tracks on Blackfriars Road, which will take you all the way up to north of Kings Cross.

There's now a good segregated route on the north bank of the river all the way from Chelsea Bridge to the East End (the section from Lambeth Bridge to Parliament is still shit but most people could manage it for that sort of distance).

 

[co-op]

The cycle routes at the south end of Vauxhall Bridge involve crossing roads, crossing each other and mixing with pedestrians on pavements and at all the lights controlled crossings. They're not, imo, particularly good and while I'll use them in preference to arguing with the traffic, in general I avoid that bridge completely. From there I'm being .

Let me tell you it's a thousand times better than cycling round Vauxhall fucking gyratory which I did many thousands of times through the 1980s and 90s and yes, car drivers whined and snivelled at every step of its proposal and implementation. Do you think car drivers will get where they want to go faster if we remove those paths?

 

[co-op]

The Cut is meant to be closed to through traffic soon
[/QUOTE]




But that'll make the air quality worse! And it'll be dangerous for cyclists! And won't someone think of the poor!


OMG it's so WRONG.

 

[co-op]

For most journeys you'll have to contend with the snarling, dangerous mess at each end, which is where the real dangers are.

Right so LTNs should be linked by cycle-safe junctions (eg like the ones put in at the south end of Vauxhall bridge which you have disparaged in a post above).

Simple.

 

[newbie]

I'm sorry that you don't feel safe on that route, but getting rid of LTNs will make that worse not better.

I'd be happy to cycle the route with you from Brixton with a beer/cuppa at either end. How about it?

[The map was an old one I happened to have saved on my phone (I prepared it myself). It goes to the bottom corner of St James' Park - to get to Marble Arch there are segregated cycle routes along the south of St James' to Buck House then along the south of Green Park to Hyde Park Corner. There are then two options - the cycle route through HP or the new segregated route up Park Lane to Marble Arch.]

I didn't say I didn't feel safe on that or any other route. Nor that that getting rid of the recent LTNs will make cycling particularly better- my point remains that backstreets are not where the main dangers lie, and LTNs do not make overall journeys significantly safer.

I'm confident and experienced and I know and understand the roads and junctions and know how to avoid the bits I don't like. I was talking about new, inexperienced cyclists who have been induced to think that these so called linked LTNs have magically made London cycling safe, because they got into it during lockdown and have believed irresponsible propaganda. They're not in a position to handcraft their own routes based on their knowledge of cycling through junctions (and I sure wouldn't suggest they follow my route which involves the ridiculous roundabout at the south end of Lambeth Bridge). They'll follow what Maps, which doesn't have a quiet route option I've ever found or Citymapper, which does, offers them (I didn't like Waze when I tried it but just d/l'd it; it doesn't even have a bike option).

 

[thebackrow]

Sure. I don't use it much but I hope it's improved for cyclists, there has to be some positives from all this. My point however, is that in itself it's not much use except for a few very local trips. For most journeys you'll have to contend with the snarling, dangerous mess at each end, which is where the real dangers are.

Well, local trips letting people get between Loughborough Junction, Herne Hill and Brixton. And then you've just been shown that there are very nearly good safe routes to both the city and west end.

If other boroughs are doing the same (which from all the noise it sounds like they are) then presumably you can go beyond the centre to areas on the other side of town. And maybe cycling rather than driving or public transport becomes a real option for more people to get around.

 

[Winot]

LTNs do not make overall journeys significantly safer.

Neither of us have official figures yet and it is early days but I predict that you are wrong here.

It cannot be the case that LTNs are simultaneously calamitously restrictive to motor vehicles and have no effect on cycle safety.

 

[teuchter]

It seems weird to argue that the quiet routes that the LTNs allow are no good because of the messy bits joining them where you have to get across a main road. Surely the solution to that is not to abandon the idea of the LTNs but to improve those main road bits? (Which has actually happened, to some extent, as part of the 'emergency measures' with some bits of main road being coned off).

(Of course then you get people complaining about the sections of coned off road, because they are stuck in a traffic jam in a car watching cyclists go along with plenty of space.)

 

[teuchter]

Let me tell you it's a thousand times better than cycling round Vauxhall fucking gyratory which I did many thousands of times through the 1980s and 90s and yes, car drivers whined and snivelled at every step of its proposal and implementation. Do you think car drivers will get where they want to go faster if we remove those paths?

The cycle routes through Vauxhall could be better but absolutely they are infinitely better than trying to negotiate that horrible gyratory on the road. I'd have avoided any route through there previously, but it's now one of the routes that I use to get from Loughborough Junction to central London.

When I've used it in recent weeks/months it's often been pretty busy with cyclists (not unusual to be in a queue of cyclists at the lights) which indicates that there's a lot of demand for it.

 

[newbie]

Neither of us have official figures yet and it is early days but I predict that you are wrong here.

It cannot be the case that LTNs are simultaneously calamitously restrictive to motor vehicles and have no effect on cycle safety.

Of course it can if the rates of people being knocked off their bikes on quiet backstreets remain of limited significance but those on the main roads increase.

Are you predicting that across London cycling will increase but cycling casualties will fall? Let's revisit this when someone produces some numbers.

 

[teuchter]

Of course it can if the rates of people being knocked off their bikes on quiet backstreets remain of limited significance but those on the main roads increase.

Are you predicting that across London cycling will increase but cycling casualties will fall? Let's revisit this when someone produces some numbers.

In the past, TfL have justified the push for more cycling by saying that the dangers of injury whilst doing it are outweighed by the health benefits of the exercise. Not everyone will be happy with this argument but I don't see why it should change just now.

It's also generally the case that the more cyclists there are, the safer it is for everyone, because motorists become accustomed to watching out for them, and better practiced at stuff like passing them safely.

 

[co-op]

The cycle routes through Vauxhall could be better but absolutely they are infinitely better than trying to negotiate that horrible gyratory on the road.

Unless they are explicitly designed to accommodate cyclists, all gyratories are a fucking cyclist's nightmare, they are absolutely intrinsically dangerous - unless you jumped lights and got across lanes in car-free periods, which is one of the reason so many of us did exactly that when these things were everywhere- causing all sorts of wailing from car drivers and police - i.e. the same people who give not one shit about the traffic laws they prefer to ignore, like speed limits.

When I've used it in recent weeks/months it's often been pretty busy with cyclists (not unusual to be in a queue of cyclists at the lights) which indicates that there's a lot of demand for it.

You can almost date the cyclists queuing at London lights from the 7/7 bombing. Never really saw it before, never really seen anything else since. Incredible really that it took a bunch of headbangers blowing up tube trains in pursuit of a literal fantasy to start changing London's transport policy to a more rational path - it's like there is literally no rational argument whatsoever that will ever achieve it.

 

[newbie]

hmm, that post above is poorly written. 'Of course it can' isn't really what I mean, I'm trying to say that cycling safety will not be improved.