Lea Bridge Road/Walthamstow mini Holland

http://www.enjoywalthamforest.co.uk/work-in-you-area/lea-bridge-road/

Please please please everyone who ever goes near this road get your comments in. This is a huge leap for an outer London borough and a huge leap full stop. Top quality infrastructure, much needed, needs your support (even if you want to say "and you could do that bit better...").

Thanks all!

also here: http://www.lfgss.com/conversations/270098/

But yeah, plans so far look great. I'm wondering what they're going to do in sections B-G with about twelfty billion side roads to deal with...

Particular detail I like is unsignalled left turns for bikes.

Slightly off topic but the cycle path going south from the industrial park by the new station crosses under Lea Bridge Rd and then stops? It continues on the other side of the road but there's no crossing. Is there owt in the planning for this?

I expect cycle lanes will be a huge improvement for Lea Bridge road but I don't quite understand why it's taking 4 months of roadworks for them to put 100 yards of lane and a new kerb or whatever into Orford Road. Or why it needs it in the first place.

This is kicking up a right stink in the area, think progress will win out eventually though, you can't stand in the way of progress (or the Council)

Crispin do you mean Orford road?

Do you have an opinion on how it's taking them so long to do what to my uneducated eye is about 3 days worth of work? I've seen 10 storey office blocks go up in less time.

This looks great. I commute everyday on the lea bridge road and it's easily the worst section of my ride. Live in the village and what they've done round orford road is excellent, good time to be an e17 cyclist.

It's a shame there's not room for a bus lane in both directions on Lea Bridge Road. I've got no issues riding northbound on it along the bus lane (although it's a bit of a ballache when the bus lane stops and drivers expect you to hop up onto the narrow pavement/cyclepath) but at peak hours the only option when heading into town is to ride along the bike path/pavement, which is crap, bumpy, slow, has bus stops along its length and is peppered with bollards, signs and so forth to dodge around.

I'd rather just use bus lanes than cycle lanes but can see the need I suppose.

Also interested to see what they do with the village and the mini Holland thing. I hope (rather selfishly) that they leave Grove Road alone as it's a handy shortcut to the north circular when I drive, but again I can see why they might change it.

Oh and it'd be nice if they'd do something about the fucking minicabs caning it along queens road (20mph limit) at a minimum of 40mph.

Edit: I used to prefer going up to blackhorse road and over the reservoir but now they've made the tottenham hale/seven sisters one way bit into a dogshit as well. My commute'll be changing soon so a better lea bridge road will be a good thing.

Hairnetnic - a lot of the side roads on the northern side of LBR are due to be closed as part of Markhouse "village" - part of the residential schemes. That's awaiting consultation. The ones south side will also be looked at as part of Leyton town centre and Church Road schemes. I'd expect they'll use "blended" crossings as per stuff starting to go in around the village borders.

Shandoom - that entire junction incl that due to be looked at, yes.

Sturmeyarcher - agree totally on Riney's pace of work. It's s-l-o-w. Why village needs "villagisation"? Well, cos unlike us, most people are terrified of cycling - so we want quiet streets they can leave their front door from. Same principle will eventually apply in an area covering from LBR to Forest, Markhouse/Blackhorse to Wood St - thousands of properties where people will be able to leave front door, ride on far quieter streets to local shops, tubes, hospital, cinema etc. And pick up main road protected tracks for longer journeys. Same principle as you find, well all over Holland (and lots of other EU places, and Hackney etc.). Plus closed streets = kids can play out again, better community links, less crime, better for businesses of the type you get on Orford and increasingly Grove etc. (and in the other villages - small, neighbourhood shops). Massively shown to boost business.

TurtleRecall - go look at the plans - wide, high-quality protected tracks the whole length of Lea Bridge Road in both directions (if we ignore Hackney, that is - hmmm). Sure, us "vehicular" fast cyclists are fine in a bus lane. My eight year old? Not so much. That mum on a Christiana? Not so much. How would they do it in Holland? Protected tracks with enough provision for all-abilities cycling and tamed junctions. Well, that's what's proposed. And bus lanes are mostly still in by the way - the ones going, if any, are the ones that TfL know don't work and actually introduce delays to buses!

The village "village" (the naming is confusing and, well, rubbish - but remember - "villages" will eventually cover LBR-Forest and Markhouse/Blackhorse-Wood) will include a closure on Grove. And basically enough roads to discourage nearly all through or rat-run traffic. In the same vein, when the Markhouse "village" kicks in, Queens is one of the roads earmarked for closure. As is Boundary. But that's all subject to engagement, and consultation. The whole point is to discourage through traffic - that tends to be faster, more aggressive and does nothing nice for an area. Sure, that means some of us will need to drive round etc. And driving in to your road may take a minute or two more as you can't necessarily cut through neighbouring streets. But small price to pay IMHO.

And driving in to your road may take a minute or two more as you can't necessarily cut through neighbouring streets. But small price to pay IMHO.

And somewhat deliberate, driving a car is too inviting at the moment, the big idea is to convert the massive amount of <3-5 mile journeys currently made by car.

I really hope they do sort out the side road issue, it's a big stumbling block to getting people to accept the worth of cycle tracks over on carriageway provision.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99T83VidSSU

Walthamstow Mini Holland scheme wins award as best "space for cycling" project in London

could it please fuck off now?

http://www.guardian-series.co.uk/news/wfnews/13720251.Grand_opening_of_mini_Holland_scheme_dominated_by_angry_protestors/

So. I made my vote today.

Saw it for myself tonight, it looks good but obvs not all the locals agree

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Haha, I bet the parking is only 100 metres away.

Nothing entices customers in better than burning to death fantasies.

I know the owner, he has a point...

The Orford road closure is not totally necessary - the same effect could have been achieved with a one way and traffic calming.

The fuss over Orford Rd and Walthamstow Village may derail the project as a whole...

I am also slightly worried that some of the cycle paths @ Whipps X might just be shared pavement space.

One-way streets are a seriously bad idea. I haven't been up there yet to have a look, but I seem to remember some minor one-ways survived into the final design, probably as a necessary compromise; in Orford Road, one-way operation would have a detrimental effect.

The task for Waltham Forest Council now is to demonstrate that local economic activity can be increased through modal filtering. People aren't worried about restricted access for motor traffic as such (that's a hook to hang their worries on, partly because of the confusion around what 'traffic' means--the vast majority of their custom comes from people on foot, on bikes, and using public transport, who are all 'traffic'), they're (rightly) worried about the place becoming more dormant--it should instead become more vibrant. This depends on good town centre management first and foremost; the place needs to appear well-cared for, with attractive and varying activity that pulls people back, e.g. street stalls, special events, etc. There should also be a strategy for changes of use, and the centre needs to retain and increase a certain 'weight of attraction', so that people feel going there is worth their while, e.g. a continually improving attractive mix of shops.

The argument to be won is, simply, that the increased amenity, of less noise, pollution, and fast-ish through motor traffic, enhances rather than takes away from the commercial viability of the centre. This is obviously a much bigger agenda than just about cycling, but in London it can work because there's no way of building high-capacity bypasses of centres, which is what has happened all over Europe where modal filtering has been done, leading to 'leap-frogging' of smaller centres and people increasingly going to only the larger centres.

I have no doubt that a majority of the residential population are already in favour of the scheme, and perhaps a majority of the traders, too; there may be data on that. Now local people have to make it work by using their local shops more and enhancing that sense of community that will hopefully come from them being more focused on improving where they live.

We'll be getting some new modal filtering schemes in Hackney soon, largely campaigned for by local residents, so there'll be a lot more action on this sort of thing, and it should take firm root in London soon, hopefully by avoiding more road-building.

Walthamstow village?

gentrifi............

oh yeah, this is London

I know the owner, he has a point...

The emergency services have confirmed they have no issue with the scheme. There have been no reported delays to emergency services and nobody has burned to death because of Mini Holland. If the shopkeeper has a point it's lost in his shrill, dishonest hysteria.

Put another way, the scheme wouldn't have gone ahead without the agreement of the emergency services, as they are statutory stakeholders. Moreover, Orford Road isn't filtered with bollards or gates but relies on timed through motor traffic restrictions, maintaining bus and emergency service access at all times. I do sympathise with shopkeepers, but as I said, the key is to demonstrate that the improvements mean people spend more time (and money) in their local shopping area, and that more/other active uses are created, showing once and for all that the urban economy is actually damaged by people constantly travelling by car, either short distances that they should and could walk or cycle, or longer distances in which they bypass the local centre (because most of the drivers going through don't stop). Needless to say, there's a huge amount to be done to shift the weight of employment away from Central London, creating more locally, and it's presently anyone's guess whether this scheme will have a major effect on that, but it's the only conceivable start.

LBWF has the highest proportion of people who work outside the borough in London. But the reaction to Mini Holland has been hysterical, the Facebook group for Walthamstow has banned discussion of it cos people were getting so abusive.

he has a point...

Which is?

Yep, we had to park a two min walk away from the Mondragone Italian restaurant because we couldn't work out the new road system. Every restaurant on the street was packed and the Mondragone was turning away people who hadn't booked.