Enfield, Kingston and Waltham Forest get £30m each to become Mini-Hollands

Not sure what you mean by the "reality"? Kind of implies some secret squirrel shadowy sinister agenda. And I'm not aware of one, if there is.

Here's the reality: TfL announce huge pot of cash; council all bid for it; councils try and balance greedy giant eyes for massive pots of cash, awards, sense of doing something good with what will get them sacked, unelected etc.; bid gets fought over between council people who love cycling, council people who love cars, cyclists at campaign, NHS and emergency services people who don't want humps on main roads, police who want other things etc. etc.; bid goes in; council wins bid; all those organisations engage again in massive barney to try and work out exactly what end result will be on the ground; people then construct end result.

I thought I was clear. But simply put, there was a clear indication from TfL as to what were the realistic limits of what should be bid for, far more than that, though, there are massive pressures on the councils from residents. Council look at comments on FB, local newspaper pieces and what they get back at ward forums, council meetings etc. Waltham Forest council is ruled by Labour, but has significant Lib Dem presence in the middle of the borough and the north of the borough is dominated by Conservatives. The councillors and officers responsible for the bid simply won't put in a bid that would see them dragged through the streets by angry mobs or vapourised at the ballot box (remember - local elections = May).

If you think there's any council in this country that can afford to go entirely against the wishes of its electorate, you're very naive about political processes. As you'll see if you go on any of the current Waltham Forest or Walthamstow Facebook groups, there's a lot of people giving love for the bid, but also a lot of people deeply angry that we're dragging them out of their cars by force.

The idea that bidding for cycling provision has no bearing on bus provision, motor capacity provision, pedestrian provision is also naive. I'm very happy to say this bid boldly takes big steps in the right direction on road capacity. It will affect motorists in the borough. But the council can't afford to reduce the borough's roads to gridlock while cyclists amble by. And the bid won't do that.

So, in short, the bid pushes hard, I believe, against the political boundaries defining it. It is, I believe, bold. It is not perfect. But I genuinely believe it is money well spent rather than pointless frippery that will be a White Elephant. That is, if it gets translated from bid to reality well. What happens next is perhaps the bigger battle and more crucial issue.

And again, I'd ask you what you're doing to make cycling better in your local area? Rather than snipe from the sidelines at schemes that genuinely are real-world, rather than utopian but unfulfilled visions, get stuck in. Get your hands dirty.

northstar wrote:

It's a load of rubbish, why did you put your name to it? (assuming you did?)

How many deaths have happened whilst the ctc and lcc and other cycling organisations have stood around and watched it happened making quiet noises but not enough to rock the boat properly because you'd lose your funding from tfl etc?

Only answer if you are prepared to be honest and not give a politicial answer.

What bits of the WF bid are a load of rubbish? These projects shouldn't 'just' be about reducing KSI but about distressing riding to school and the shops. Make cycling easy and a nice experience and people will do it. Make driving inconvenient, difficult and expensive and people won't.

However money is allocated the success or failure of the plans are 99.5% down to the implementation. Having a great plan that doesn't get built is as good as having a crap one that does.

teaboy wrote:

northstar wrote:

It's a load of rubbish, why did you put your name to it? (assuming you did?)

How many deaths have happened whilst the ctc and lcc and other cycling organisations have stood around and watched it happened making quiet noises but not enough to rock the boat properly because you'd lose your funding from tfl etc?

Only answer if you are prepared to be honest and not give a politicial answer.

What bits of the WF bid are a load of rubbish? These projects shouldn't 'just' be about reducing KSI but about distressing riding to school and the shops. Make cycling easy and a nice experience and people will do it. Make driving inconvenient, difficult and expensive and people won't.

However money is allocated the success or failure of the plans are 99.5% down to the implementation. Having a great plan that doesn't get built is as good as having a crap one that does.

For starters slide 35 is a load of rubbish. What's difference between the two pictures apart from painting the bike lanes white?? Extra paint on the road does not constitute infrastructure.

Slide 52 - right hand - why does the cycle path disappear at the junction to the one-way road only to reappear afterwards??

Not sure exactly what you mean here? Is this High Road Leyton at Leyton Station? Or do you mean a different slide? If so, do you mean with Maud Road junction? It's a zebra crossing there? Don't know if they're legally allowed to run a cycle lane through a zebra?!

Either way, please understand the drawings particularly in the bid were a rush job (see the Whipps X spaghetti tangle particularly). Things will change still a lot. And the Leyton station bridge is certainly one area we're not happy with the plan - and the council know that.

1. Sorry for delay, been a bit busy here and I didn't realise I wasn't getting notifications from road.cc

2. "It's a load of rubbish, why did you put your name to it? (assuming you did?)"

Well, chap, you're going to have to be a bit more specific on what bits are "rubbish" for me to get a handle on what you're after.

It's not *my* bid, so my name isn't on it. It's the council's bid. But I, as Council Liaison for Waltham Forest CC, was one of the people who've been most involved in back-and-forth negotiations on the bid. And WFCycling (as we're also known) officially "endorsed" the bid. So, I guess you could say I put my name to it.

Why? Because I genuinely believe it's a massive, huge leap forward in attitude and action from a council who was already moving in the right direction on cycling. Because I believe it's better to get 30million spent on a good bid than some of the rubbish bid that were put in. Because I believe the bid was one of the more visionary and serious bids put in - and was at the very limit of what a) local residents who aren't cyclists will accept without Walthamstow devolving into a political warzone, b) what TfL indicated to the boroughs was actually deliverable and c) represents actually good money spent on good stuff. You don't agree, I'm inferring.

3. "How many deaths have happened whilst the ctc and lcc and other cycling organisations have stood around and watched it happened making quiet noises but not enough to rock the boat properly because you'd lose your funding from tfl etc?"

I have no idea how many deaths have happened, or the timeframe you'd count as being the time those orgs have "stood around". But really? I mean really?

You don't want a "political answer", so how's this? F-you. I haven't ever "stood around" or made "quiet noises" about anything. Anyone who knows me will be ROFLing at that one. So how dare you characterise someone you have no idea about at all and lump me in with organisations I have, at best, tangential relationships with. That's like, I don't know, drivers calling all cyclists red light jumpers! I'd also add, how on earth do you get through life with such a rude, dismissive and uninformed attitude about those around you?

To calm down from that slightly, and give you a more political answer, WFCycling is a part, but independent part of LCC - that's the way LCC is set up. It's not affiliated to CTC. I don't see eye to eye with either org on everything. And I'm certainly much happier with LCC since its last AGM and motions that properly, finally embrace all-ages, all-abilities cycling, segregated measures etc. I have for many years, in my volunteering work at WFCycling fought for Dutch-style measures, and been very loud and forthright about the issues we face. I have had a fractious and difficult relationship with councillors and engineers. But I kept up those relationships because I believe it's good to engage, be clear, but polite and hopefully change minds than just carp from the sidelines.

In return, I'll ask you - what are you doing to make cycling better for everyone? And no, flaming people on forums doesn't count...

northstar wrote:

I can predict what your response will be so save yourself the time and don't bother.

Go for a ride dude.

I hope that's what you were expecting.

bikebot wrote:

northstar wrote:

I can predict what your response will be so save yourself the time and don't bother.

Go for a ride dude.

I hope that's what you were expecting.

I think i heard a mouse.

Konazing wrote:

Same old moaners on this forum talking like they could solve the problem of how you squeeze buses, cars, cyclists,pedestrians, into a road network built hundreds of years ago for the one mode of transport you don't see on the road these days horse and cart!

Coming from someone with only 1 post under their belt: either you've got a gold medal in the Olympic sport of holding your tongue, or you thought you would wade in with not much thought at all.

I'll let you into a little secret: the people who are responsible for design the infrastructure and managing the flow of traffic in and around London actually have no idea what they are doing. Their models are based on 1960 principles. When they are shown time again that they failed to work (correctly predict traffic flow), or catastrophes they predicted did not come true, they point blank refuse to either abandon the models for ones that would work, or even adapt them so they would.

The mindset within Surface Traffic departments in TfL is that nothing must affect traffic flow, including all design recommendations that would improve conditions, and reduce death and serious injuries, to the most vulnerable road users.

I know this as fact because of several things: seeing how TfL have behaved over the last decade with road design and their attitude to vulnerable road users, through reports such as the ones from Buchanan and Jacobs (consultants for Kings Cross and Bow Roundabout respectively) and that I know someone who works at a management level within TfL and has to battle with these people on an almost daily basis.

To put it frankly, I am happy that people who are vulnerable road users are taking an interest in road design and urban planning rather than your attitude that 'its best left to those who know about these things', when those people so obviously do not and really should be facing corporate manslaughter charges for their criminal negligence that have caused the deaths of multiple numbers of pedestrians and cyclists.

zanf wrote:

Konazing wrote:

Same old moaners on this forum talking like they could solve the problem of how you squeeze buses, cars, cyclists,pedestrians, into a road network built hundreds of years ago for the one mode of transport you don't see on the road these days horse and cart!

Coming from someone with only 1 post under their belt: either you've got a gold medal in the Olympic sport of holding your tongue, or you thought you would wade in with not much thought at all.

.

Post count is not relevant

wwfcb wrote:

zanf wrote:

Konazing wrote:

Same old moaners on this forum talking like they could solve the problem....

Coming from someone with only 1 post under their belt.....

Post count is not relevant

Post count is completely relevant when it begins like that and ends without offering any constructive information or viewpoint.

Therefore it is nothing more than either a very shitty beginning, or a even shittier first post of a troll account.

zanf wrote:

wwfcb wrote:

zanf wrote:

Konazing wrote:

Same old moaners on this forum talking like they could solve the problem....

Coming from someone with only 1 post under their belt.....

Post count is not relevant

Post count is completely relevant when it begins like that and ends without offering any constructive information or viewpoint.

Therefore it is nothing more than either a very shitty beginning, or a even shittier first post of a troll account.

No it must be a troll account your right, no one could possibly have the audacity to comment on something you have already put to bed with your post.

Sorry i've re read your post and.....nope still think its moanie! but dont worry, like you said this is probably a troll account..phew!

Same old BS about "I've written 300 odd posts on a cycling website so I'm the font of all knowledge when it comes to cycling" you know zero about my knowledge, cycling or otherwise. I'm commenting on your negative comments on what are very promising proposals, your complete ignorance on the subject of who is running what in TfL/local government transport departments just tells me 'your mate' (another great classic post by the way) "I've got a mate who knows a bloke who used to play golf with the top spuds a TfL" isn't as high as he's been telling you. You are right about having to accommodate lots of modes of transport and the political balance is tough. I hope you put some of your obvious passion into helping develop cycling in London rather than just moaning about it.

P.S that's 2 posts....how exciting this posting thing is easier than I thought. I thought you had to be an expert to do it......seems not......

You must be looking at a different design, there's nothing turbo about the design proposed for New Malden. It'll certainly slow the traffic compared to the current configuration as it's a much smaller radius.

The existing roundabout is massive, much larger than it needs to be because it was designed for the minimum turning radius of the tram tracks which covered those roads until the middle of the last century.

The bid notes that the design is just an outline pending the results of the TfL trial roundabout, wherever that is.

bikebot wrote:

You must be looking at a different design, there's nothing turbo about the design proposed for New Malden. It'll certainly slow the traffic compared to the current configuration as it's a much smaller radius.

The existing roundabout is massive, much larger than it needs to be because it was designed for the minimum turning radius of the tram tracks which covered those roads until the middle of the last century.

The bid notes that the design is just an outline pending the results of the TfL trial roundabout, wherever that is.

Yes there is, you can't fool me into thinking they are doing but nothing but making things easier for motor vehicle traffic.

"fool you". Oh boy, did you get out the bed on the wrong side today. No, I'm not trying to perform conjuring tricks especially for you, I just have an opinion. Mine is based on living near that area and riding those roads regularly.

I've looked through the Kingston proposals and I think it's mostly good stuff that is an improvement. As someone else has revealed, the planner involved in the Kingston proposal is a cyclist, which explains a lot. They were certainly better proposals than some of the neighbouring areas such as Merton, a borough that regularly builds utterly stupid facilities.

I hope the other two areas hold more promising designs than the picture above suggests, which we'll all agree contains large amounts of dumb.

teaboy wrote:

I'm fairly hopeful for Waltham Forest - there are a couple of 'almost good' segregated cycle lanes on Orient Way and Argyll Way. If something slightly improved can be taken along Lea Bridge Road then things will be great.

Agreed, in the few months I commuted from Walthamstow to Farringdon I was hit, head on (with cars turning in to me) twice quite badly on Lea Bridge Road.

It's horrendous, drivers don't look. It's such an integral stretch for commuters too. Hopefully they get it right.

mooleur wrote:

teaboy wrote:

I'm fairly hopeful for Waltham Forest - there are a couple of 'almost good' segregated cycle lanes on Orient Way and Argyll Way. If something slightly improved can be taken along Lea Bridge Road then things will be great.

Agreed, in the few months I commuted from Walthamstow to Farringdon I was hit, head on (with cars turning in to me) twice quite badly on Lea Bridge Road.

It's horrendous, drivers don't look. It's such an integral stretch for commuters too. Hopefully they get it right.

I think we can all agree that what Lea Bridge Road needs is more 1-ft-wide strips of red paint, with bollards in.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.56599,-0.036657,3a,75y,74.84h,71.82t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sqm2kbkwsyxnQLlfKzT8qyg!2e0!6m1!1e1

Gizmo_ wrote:

I think we can all agree that what Lea Bridge Road needs is more 1-ft-wide strips of red paint, with bollards in.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.56599,-0.036657,3a,75y,74.84h,71.82t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sqm2kbkwsyxnQLlfKzT8qyg!2e0!6m1!1e1

No need to remind me what the road looks like, I've had my face wiped up from it enough.

The "cycleways" along that road are an insult to logic.