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While broadly in favour of them, this was the worst planned fiasco
Same. Still sad it has gone though. Selfishly, it made my journey along Norbury Park, Streatham Common and Valley Road much more enjoyable. I hope they are able to re-instate something soon. Car usage in South London is out of control. And I say that as a car owner. That needs to be addressed before trying the kind of LTN they tried in Streatham Wells. Or suck it up and force peoples' hands by making driving the least convenient option (or even less convenient). There's a mentality in the suburbs that you can just jump in the car and expect to get where you need to go unhindered. Anyone who tells you otherwise is seen as a loon. Two thirds of households in Croydon and only a third of households in Lambeth own a car. A third of journeys in London by car are less than 2km. Only 20% of journeys are made for work. That is disgusting.
While the LTNs don't help (in the short term) when implemented as badly as in SW, it's the sheer number of unnecessary, single occupant journeys. But no one wants to hear that. I have been traveling from Thornton Heath to Streatham Wells (Gleneldon Road initially and now Sunnyhill Primary) and back, twice a day for nearly 4 years now. The traffic on the A23 has always been shit. Long before the LTN that 6 mile journey by car could take up to 90 minutes and was a big factor in me getting a cargo bike. People will campaign and physically go out and protest about anything that impinges on their "driving freedom", citing poor public transport (try getting a bus in Northern Ireland), lack of safe cycling infrastructure etc. But you won't see the same people out protesting for better and safer buses and trains, more cycle lanes etc.
@Oliver Schick my view is that it was maybe too broad and unfortunately coincided with a number of unplanned road works, particularly on Leigham Court Road which compounded some of the tailbacks. All of the traffic that would have used Valley Road to bypass the High Road, was all of a sudden dumped back onto the High Road. They need to find another way for Valley Road to not be the default rat run to avoid the High Road. I don't know the best way to do that and I imagine it's why they had to make it so broad as there are a lot of interconnecting roads.
stevo_com-
Yeah - I don't disagree with that.
re Road works. Leigham Court Road has some terrible water infrastructure problems. In the 12 years we've been here, it gets leaks at least once a year with predictably short term patching up each time. It will always have regular works on it and any cursory review of the last few years should have picked that up.
In the LTN itself, the roads in the south part are so steep that there will never be much walking/cycling increase there. It may have worked with single LTN areas either side of Valley Road, but keeping that as a through way to keep some of the pressure off the High Road.
Streatham Common North became a nightmare to ride down with solid traffic and random u-turning. the edge of the common was trashed by vehicles mounting the curb to filter.
Having previously commuted from Streatham to Kings Cross with loads of cycle lanes, now I do across to Hammersmith where there are none on the route and it is so much less pleasant, but the last 5 months with the LTN made this end significantly worse. -
Or suck it up and force peoples' hands by making driving the least convenient option (or even less convenient).
When the LTN near me was introduced one of the stated aims was to make driving more inconvenient for residents (hence a lack of resident exemption).
villa-ru
aggi
That's great.
We've just had the massively shit LTN in Steratham binned because of the carnage it caused everywhere else. While broadly in favour of them, this was the worst planned fiasco I've seen and made cycling and public transport 100x more shit during its brief existence.