Hackney LCC meeting
Wednesday 2 April 2003

Venue:
Brenda's house, London Fields, London E8

Present:
Tim Evans, Marian Farrugia, Oliver Schick, Richard Lewis, Brenda Puech, Trevor Parsons

Apologies:
Patrick Field, Sally Haywill

Topics discussed:
1. Reports back
2. Bike Week
3. Trailers
4. Latham's
5. Hackney Society
6. Residential parking
7. NCN1
8. Hackney Museum
9. LCN+ meeting
10. Streetscape Design Guide
11. London Cycling Conference
12. Meeting venue
13. Social event(s)
14. Website
15. AOB

1. Reports back
The Transport Sub-Partnership meeting was cancelled this month.

LBH has finally agreed to pay us £1495 for our expenses for last year's Car Free Day.

Oliver went to the Good Place to Live sub-partnership. Gave an insight into what they're up to. They've allocated their spending for the coming financial year but there may be space for us to put in projects for funding from their contingency fund. Such projects must be ready to go, though, so we should be prepared.

Oliver also met Danny Gayle, senior traffic engineer, with respect to Northwold Road and its cushions and tables. Work has started and is progressing very slowly.

Also Oliver met DG, John Larkin and other stakeholders in the Shacklewell Lane scheme and looked at options for fixing this notorious junction. Danny is concerned about timing - has secured about £200,000 for this scheme, which will enable a broadly beneficial environmental scheme.

Sally left two reports on Tim's answering machine: Groundwork apparently hadn't put any of their Safe Routes money towards STAbikes, which she was surprised about; and that STAbikes currently has no funding assured. We suggested that she speak to David Hare of the Transport Sub-Partnership about applying for further funding.

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2. Bike week

Breakfasts
Brenda says we should do the London Fields one, but not the other one (Clissold), Marian advises, because people are more chilled in the evening in. London Fields one let's have it mid-week, so Wednesday 18th. Ben will take charge, apparently! Oliver says we should make sure to put up signs up where people go across London Fields.

Eastway event
This inter-borough event, planned for the 15th June, clashes with the Finsbury bikefest and also with Stokefest, which wants us to participate in a procession. Oliver will talk to neighbourhing boroughs about moving it to the 22nd. Some discussion about the purpose of the Eastway event. Last time it was not an exceptionally well focused event. Could be good for getting kids and teenagers introduced to the facility. But is exam time! Geoffrey of Waltham Forest apparently prefers 22nd anyway. [Ed. Subsequently decided to stick with event on the 15th].

Rides: historical and bounds ride
Oliver wants to do a Bike The Bounds ride. Some discussion about co-ordinating it with the soiree which Marian wants to do. Oliver says do it on Saturday 21st, and concluded he'd prefer not to do it on the same day as the soiree.

Soiree
Marian thought of having a soiree for commuters coming back from work. Tim suggested it'd be good to try on a day when people aren't going out for a drink after work already. Marian will check with Islington and Haringey and find out what is happening on Monday and Thursday of bike week, and then will decide and inform. Venue in mind: near the Robinson Crusoe pub, west end of Church Street where it crosses Green Lanes. Tim suggested the fiddler that Sally knows that likes coming along to play at 'cycle-y' events.

Deadlines for registration
Next week. Has to be put in online on the LCC website. Marian volunteered to do this. We're working on a deadline of Sunday.

Co-ordination with other boroughs
Brenda will talk to Barry Mason from Greenwich about any events of his/theirs that may stray into our area.

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3. Trailers

Last meeting Richard was asked to go and have a look at trailers for our stall. There is a selection. Bob Yak - prob too small. Orbit looks useful and flexible. Richard has a basement where it could live. Needs an easily transferable hitching system. Might be worth trying Lucy to see if she wants to sell hers as she's leaving London, though Tim didn't think that so good. Columbus is capacious, widely hitchable and thoroughly debugged. Richard to check out about the Columbus hitch to see how easy it is to change, and if it is, then get it! (And don't forget the LCC discount, Stuart!)

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4. Latham's

Oliver went to a public meeting on the proposed developemnt. 600+ residential, 70 'live-work', 8000 square metres of commercial on a 13-acre site. Too dense, Oliver says. They want to have 581 car parking spaces, which they think is a low level of provision, but it seems like a lot to us. The figure seems to be calculated to cover all the units which have residential elements. Most units will be offered to come with a car parking space. Oliver spoke to Mike Lambert of Countryside, the developer. The reason why the development is going ahead as it is is because Latham's have specified a certain amount of money they want to get out of the site. Brenda: the council should knock their demands down. Oliver: they have to a certain extent, eg to reduce the height of the block from 12 storeys to six stories, but this may have been a red herring, he thinks. They didn't reduce the density, though - just reduced the floor space per unit.

No clear policy guidance in Hackney, no master plan for the area. Developing in a vacuum.

Main problem is the car parking. Sue Foster said they might knock them down to 0.5 car parking spaces per dwelling unit.

Oliver wants to challenge things like the developers' report on traffic impact.

Tim wondered whether we can pull in the help of Tom Bogdanowicz at the LCC office, seeing as it the GLA's intervention is crucial here. He also suggested approaching Planning Aid for London (run by the Royal Town Planning Institute).

So far there is no mention of cycle parking and accessibility in the outline brief.

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5. Hackney Society

Oliver wants us to affiliate with the Society. Would cost about 15 quid a year, and would improve our communications. Proposed by Oliver, and agreed nem con. Oliver will give the details to Brenda and she will send the application.

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6. Residential parking

This is partly coming out of Latham's. We want to develop a proposal for possible funding by GPTL/TSP. Audit of estates for likelihood/demand etc. We have asked Dave Holladay of Transport Management Solutions informally to give us an outline of a project.

Questions about proper way of drawing up specification for a project to propose for funding. Richard says that partnerships with local authorities don't need to go out to tender - we should find out more about this.

Oliver and Trevor to work with Dave Holladay to produce a specification: audit of likely estates (esp. places without lifts). Pick [a number] of estates, survey and install.

Marian's estate. Clissold Estate, landlord is Newlon Housing Association. Just moved in three months ago, has to bring carry it up three flights. Now parks outside, though on railings in a central place. Lots of bikes on the balconies. Wants to have a cycle fest in the courtyard and get demand and interest going. Apply for money from Millennium Awards to pay for maintenance/rides/consultation about facilities people want.

We should look at the example of Ealing estates where Robert Davis has arranged for lockers to be put in. Featured in London Cyclist magazine April/May 2003. Maybe we could arrange a day to go over there and visit and see what they've done there.

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7. NCN1

Oliver met Sarah Parry Jones of Sustrans recently. Last year we rode the route options of NCN1 and routes linking Clapton Park to Victoria Park. Got email through from Lucy McMenemy who had put in bid to remodel Mabley Green and incorporating our suggestions to link Mabley with the Red Path. Sarah didn't seem to be all that aware of the detail in this. Sarah will be happy to cycle the route again and refresh our views on the options. Oliver will contact Sarah Parry Jones to set up this ride.

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8. Hackney Museum

Hackney Museum offers a small space that voluntary groups can use to present themselves. Temporary. They also would like some LCC membership leaflets. Staff very keen and helpful. Oliver will get from Lucy the contact details for our distribution network. Trevor suggests we get Douglas to use this as his exhibition space for the health workers photographic display, in memory of Nick Hutt. Dave Holladay knows all about portable collapsable display stuff. Trevor will give Richard Dave's details.

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9. LCN+ meeting

Brenda, Oliver, Richard interested in going to the LCN+ meeting tomorrow at LCC office. One of the areas discussed was Hackney Central, so we should try to find out what is proposed here.

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10. Streetscape Design Guide

Oliver went along to the seminar/workshop yesterday on developing a design guide for the streets of the borough. Design standards for the streetscape, less clutter, hodgepodge, etc. Best practice when designing footways etc. WS Atkins' consultant is Peter Heath, who really knows what he's doing. He's an urban planner who used to work for Westminster Council and did the works on the Strand. Were a couple of stakeholders: police, urban designers from Islington, John Larking (chair of Shacklewell Community Association). Need for a 'bloody-minded individual' in the council to doggedly pursue the design literacy. Peter Agudogo is the lead officer who commissioned the design guide. Much lower turnout than they expected, but we were there. Interesting to hear the perspectives of crime prevention officers.

Concerned about interface of footway and highway, traffic mgmt and streetscape design go hand-in-hand. Engineering out the need for guard-railing. Kerb lines, keeping them straight. Uncluttering junctions. All was like kicking on open doors. Surfaces and services issue. Cycle parking was brought up as a possible clutter/accessibility problem, but this can be off-set if guardrails removed and replaced by cycle parking stands.

We need to make sure they get a copy of the report done by Transport Management Solutions on the recent street parking project.

Also make them aware of Rupert Bentley Walls's suggestion for protecting trees by surrounding them with cycle parking stands.

Drains were raised as a hazard by Marian. [Ed. The traffic department of the state of Texas commissioned an excellent report on Bicycling Hazard Detection and Mitigation - could be worth suggesting Atkins/LBH get a copy of that].

Mode filters need to be designed in and required for all motor traffic closures.

Circulation of draft document in May. Public consultation/exhbition not yet timetabled.

Oliver and Trevor will co-ordinate a further response by email to Peter Heath.

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11. London Cycling Conference

May 10th. TfL-sponsored. About the cycling plan for London drawn up by the Cycling Centre for Excellence. Starts on Friday 9th and goes to the 11th. Priority for borough co-ordinators, then anyone can register, it seems. See LCC website for more details.

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12. Meeting venue

We need an accessible venue with good facilities. Victoria Park Harriers has a committee meeting with a hall, but is not very central. Richard will see if the Weatherspoons pub has a private room.

How about Centerprise? Eco-Active centre? Hackney Society has its own meeting room. Tim will talk to Eco-Active and report back.

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13. Social event(s)

Tim had suggested that we could start a 'regional' drinking/social get-together. Postcoded groups, as it were. (eg Richard for Hackney Central, Oliver for Clapton, Trevor for Shoreditch). Would this be linked to Ben's enthusiasm to be master of ceremonies? If Tim has time, he will fish names and addresses out of the group database to invite to area meetings. Keep it social primarily.

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14. Website

Trevor reported on the progress of getting control over our domain again after the acquisition of Cerbernet by an unhelpful megacorp called Business Serve plc. There could be more budget available if necessary to develop the site once it's up again, as was agreed at the last meeting. [Ed: Domain back up and running as of 2nd May]

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15. AOB

Marian has heard that there have been thefts and even armed robberies of bikes at the Community College.

Oliver says Brooke Road campus has had a meeting about secure cycle parking, which included Graham Chapman, crime prevention officer from the Met. Oliver intends to get back to Brooke House to give them info on cycle parking standards.

Oliver has been in touch with Ian Callaghan at the LCC re their work on residential cycle parking. LCC will soon have a standard to show on this issue.

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Next Meeting Wednesday 7 May, 8pm, venue TBC.

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