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Yup, that presentation has some very questionable bits (thanks for sharing it @Airhead). The point about a main road being like a river that bursts its banks when there's too much traffic neglects to mention that the water in the adjacent, flooded fields can't actually go anywhere until the height of the main river itself drops so that the floodwater in the fields it can rejoin. Allowing traffic into the adjacent streets is therefore doomed as a policy, since it will just back up there as a result of the next pinch point.
That said, I realise that what they're trying to do with TCPR is to keep through traffic on the main roads. Having cycled, driven and walked that area I think it will definitely benefit from eliminating that corner-cutting and be much more pleasant as a result. However, TCPR seems like a half-arsed solution, since it doesn't do anything to deter a major source of traffic i.e., ridiculous short journeys being made by car. What's said about LTN's is really questionable (my notes in bold):
• LTN’s have various forms but they focus on modal shift of transport usage by making it more difficult for all vehicles (apart from the vehicles that we actually want people to use i.e., cycles). These include road closures, cycle lanes, school streets and pedestrianisation.
• Blunt instrument for tackling rat running alone, more affective at reducing total traffic including local. (This is implies that local traffic is not a problem, but it is. Our transport policy has to be joined-up to make these changes have the desired effect and giving local residents the option of effectively vetoing the changes having any effect on them undermines that.)
• Very High impact on emergency vehicles, public transport and local activity (This is just questionable all round, LTNs don't block public transport unless you build them across a bus route, and the evidence for the impact on emergency vehicles is shaky and very possibly offset by health benefits of greater activity and the greater safety of having more people travelling actively on the street)
• Re‐distributes vehicle capacity to other transport modes (well yes, that's sort of the point)
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ffm
Thanks for the update on lbhf. Hope it goes well.
Yet another appalling presentation - falsely saying main roads are like rivers. Car traffic is not a force of nature, it is a product of human choices - it would be useful for assistant directors in LBHF to recognise this fundamental point.