Mini Holland - recycled

COMMENT FROM BORIS:

In the past decade, cycling in London has trebled. Two wheels have never been more popular and in response to that rise in demand I am making the biggest improvements to our roads in a generation.

We are investing £300m in ripping out and replacing the capital's biggest and nastiest road junctions to make them safer and less threatening. We are creating a series of enhanced cycling superhighways, urban 'quietways' for more cautious cyclists and helping our outer London boroughs 'go Dutch' and become mini-Hollands.

By increasing the number of journeys made by bike, we can cut overcrowding on public transport, ease congestion, slash pollution and reduce competition for parking spaces. That's why everyone really is a winner in London's cycling revolution!

Mini Holland  March 2013

Believing that before commenting on a subject a bit of research is necessary I decided to take a long look at the Waltham Forest Council’s successful Mini Holland bid. Having been granted £30m (the equivalent of 1.5 new Secondary schools) by Boris it looks as if cyclists will be in heaven. From the Tour de France that will close Lea Bridge Road this year to every road being made cycle friendly - what more could a cyclist want!

In a democracy I have always believed the majority view wins the argument. This report uses statistics to argue its case but if you turn the figures around a different story emerges.

2011 Census shows:

 58% of Waltham Forest households have access to a car.

Walthamstow Town Centre residents - 50% have cars and 96% do not cycle to work.

At my place of work there are a 1,000 people and 99% do not cycle to work.

So how can £30m be spent for the benefit of so few?

As a daily cyclist and pedestrian, occasional car driver and even less a bus user one of my biggest issues with the attitude of the report is it is already encouraging cyclists to share the pavement with pedestrians - extremely dangerous and it won’t be long before a child is seriously injured. More than once, as a cyclist in the road, a pedestrian has just wandered in front of me and as a pedestrian I frequently dice with death as cyclists try to grab the same bit of pavement as me!

The whole document is predicated on cycling being the only way forward. No mention is made of the needs of pedestrians, that is all of us at sometime, motorists - most of us travel by car at some point, white van man and refuse collection we all need to maintain our homes, buses to get about and of course in an emergency fire engines, ambulances oh and of course police cars or are they all coming by bike! A balanced document it is NOT!

“We are introducing a radical cycle-friendly scheme to calm the streets” says the council. As the streets are already full who is going to be moved away? All streets need to accommodate delivery vehicles and emergency vehicles otherwise what is civilisation?

“A better public realm will involve reallocating space away from the car by removing parking” Walthamstow Village is a great example – the Village CPZ has removed the commuter cars and they now clutter Shernhall Street causing traffic congestion for all road users including cyclists. Cycling is now more difficult in the Village because you have to weave in and out of the parked cars causing problems to drivers coming through the Village. The other extreme is Carr Road which is completely full of parked cars as it is not in the CPZ and cars have to travel around for ages trying to find a space to park getting in the way of cyclists.

I am old enough to remember when our streets had no parked cars and what traffic there was flowed easily. Now with parking on both sides of roads we have reduced the road space by two thirds. This should never have been allowed to happen. If they are cleared away to allow access to cycles where will the cars go?

“Reduce reliance on the car for local journeys” - there is no point is saying people should give up their cars – they have them because they are affordable and more convenient for most people – the owners won’t be swapping their cars for bicycles! Even more importantly there is a huge majority of people who cannot travel any distance except by car i.e. disabled, elderly, and children. Cycling is only for the fit from 10 years to 60 years and only if they have no goods to carry! Interestingly I would suggest a small car with 4 people in it takes up less room than 4 cyclists.

In Singapore a huge tax (at least £10k) is put on every new car and is refunded when the car is compulsorily scrapped after 10 years but still car ownership is vast. The city authorities design public transport and roads to provide what residents need without all the streets being cluttered.

The author of this report must live in a parallel universe to me. The council wants to permit two way cycling in one-way streets – “This has already dramatically improved links between Lloyd Park, The Town Hall, residential areas and shops on Hoe Street”. Who in their right mind would consider cycling along Hoe Street – walking is bad enough!

Even if these dreams come anywhere near being implemented we need to be clear what is being lost. The wonderful green of Whipps Cross roundabout, a great edge to Epping Forest, will be lost as it is converted to a conventional junction with traffic lights. Not being a traffic engineer I cannot say if this will work, but if Whipps Cross Road gets congested our emergency services needing access to the hospital could be in jeopardy.

Just to confirm the author’s dream world apparently “Villagisation” will take place and  we will have pocket parks and parklets in Walthamstow Village, Markhouse Village and Blackhorse Village and it “will mean most residents of the Borough (250,000 people) are within 15 minutes cycle ride of Walthamstow” – maybe for Barry Wiggins!

Having spent over an hour enjoying this document I think you have probably got the gist of it. As I look at particular areas I will let you have a further look into the dream world of the cyclist.

But to close with a real gem “The min Holland area will be subject to extensive modelling and investigation prior to the implementation of the second phase of closures to minimise the risk of creating gridlock”!

Adrian Stannard