Hackney LCC meeting
Wednesday 6 July 2005
Venue:
Marcon
Court Estate Community Hall, E8
Members
present:
Marian Farrugia (Chairing), Brenda
Puech (Treasurer), Richard Lewis (Secretary), Trevor Parsons (Media),
David Farnham, Ben Webster, Tim Evans, Jed Keenan, David Smith, Georgie
Fyfe-Jamieson, Simon Hughes, Katie Hanson
Guests present:
Symon Sterne, Olu Soyoye, Jean
Cantrell, Sarah Northam (all from London Borough of Hackney)
Apologies:
None
received.
Topics
discussed:
1. Hackney Parking and Enforcement Plan
Consultation Workshop
2. Matters arising and actions from June meeting
3. Finfest and Hoxton Street party / Shoreditch Parade
4. Car Free Day
5.
East London Line and Dalston Lane South Area Action Plan
6. Hackney
Local Implementation Plan
7. Windus streets for people / 'home zone'
8. Lower
Clapton review – report
9. Upper Clapton Sustainable Development Plan
10. Any
other business
1.
Hackney Parking and Enforcement Plan Consultation Workshop
Symon Sterne, who is Hackney's
parking and enforcement manager and himself lives in the borough, gave
a presentation and participation exercise on the council's parking and
enforcement plan.
Symon
showed his awareness of the three prongs of contemporary cycling
policy, namely infrastructure,
training and promotion, as laid out in the
draft Hackney Cycling Plan, and was keen for Hackney's (motor vehicle)
parking and enforcement to support this as much as possible. The
council's Parking and Enforcement Plan is a five-year strategy which
seeks to balance the needs of residents and visitors. It is driven by
the policies of the mayor of Hackney, as well as by those of the
mayor of London. The Plan has three
sections: a policy plan, an operational plan, and a work plan. The latter two of these
will be dynamic documents which are updated continuously.
Symon
talked about a range of issues including the requirements of disabled
people, community service passes, and safety and crime. He was
asked whether the plan is governed by the same hierarchy of road
users as has been established in Hackney's transport policies generally
since it was orignally
set during the Local Agenda 21 process). He said he couldn't
confirm this, but he would be guided by the Cycling Plan.
Symon is meeting other interested groups to discuss their concerns too.
In the ensuing brainstorming
session, a number of key issues were raised by members, including:
- Dooring due
in part to road markings directing cycles too close to parked cars, eg
Navarino Road;
- problems of
on-footway and obstructive car parking;
- one-way
streets and contraflow cycling; cycle parking in new development;
- the plan
should contribute to reducing car dependency;
- car clubs;
- on-street
cycle parking;
- promoting
modal shift;
- raising
business awareness of the benefits of catering for cyclists.
Key suggestions included:
- A graded
permit price for households with second (and more) motors, with a
higher price per extra vehicle;
- a cap on the
number of vehicles to be parked on street by a household;
- no one-way
streets without two-way working for cycles;
- motorcycles
should not receive additional parking beyond operational needs (eg
couriers, pizza delivery).
Key questions included:
- Would there
be more car-free development? (Answer given: Yes)
- Would there
be a policy of maximising car parking on roads in the CPZ? (Answer given: Not necessarily –
Hackney’s CPZs are quality not revenue led).
- Would there
be resident priority for spaces to minimise parking demand? (Answer given: Yes)
- Have our
previous comments been included? (Answer given: Yes — LCCiH produced the
most comprehensive response of all. though the council has not
incorporated all our points).
Symon explained that the
parking surplus is £1.5m p/a which can be spent on
politically-defined priorities. However this is only a small part of
the overall transport budget.
Actions: Further comments
on the plan will be developed by the group and forwarded to Symon. We
will stay in contact through six-monthly 'parking forums'. This
exercise was regarded very much as the first stage.
Symon will now compile all the comments and suggestions from the
workshop and send us a copy. He has also invited cyclists to
submit any other comments and issues they think relevant, both through
the feedback forms that he distributed and/or by emailing him at
symon.sterne@DELETEhackney.gov.uk. Symon proposed that we hold a bigger
workshop in a few months to delve a bit in more depth on some of the
issues.
Read Hackney
LCC's contribution to the draft version of the Parking and Enforcement
Plan (PDF) or Google's
HTML version.
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2. Matters
arising and actions from June meeting
We deferred discussion of the
proposed celebration of the STA Bikes National
Cycling Project Award to the next meeting.
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3. Finfest
and Hoxton Street party / Shoreditch Parade
Finfest – David Farnham
and Paul Singer will be present at Finfest. Richard will make the
Columbus trailer available and ready for the event, stocked with
leaflets for the stall which will be available to us.
Hoxton St / Shoreditch Parade
– Trevor is leading on this. Richard will supply the large
trailer and will set up and run the stall. Trevor to arrange parade
participation if possible. (We
won the 'most entertaining' category with an Abba tribute conveyed on a
quadricycle. Ed.)
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4. Car-free
day — September 22nd
We will not be running the Shoreditch
Carnival & Car Free Day this year. Trevor and his colleagues in
the Shoreditch Carnival team cannot afford to work for three months
unpaid for a third year running, though they hope to use this breathing
space to spend time building up the capacity of the organisation for
future years, possibly applying for charitable status and fundraising
so that the event can be run annually on a sustainable basis.
But Trevor is suggesting that we should facilitate the holding of a Car
Free Day event, on the proper international Car Free Day, Thursday 22nd September, to take place around
Gayhurst School on the west side of London Fields. If the proposal
is supported, funding may be available via the travel awareness
allocation which is granted annually to Hackney Council by TfL. Trevor
to pursue in consultation with residents groups and Gayhurst school
(parents, governors and head teacher).
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5. East
London Line and Dalston
area action plan
A group called Open Dalston
has been established to represent conservation and environmental groups
and respond to the Action Plan. A drop-in event will be held to explain
the scheme proposals on 11th and 13th July, at the CLR James Library in
Dalston Lane and the Halkevi Centre in Stoke Newington,
respectively.
Action: Richard to meet David
Farnham at the library on 11th July to discuss possible responses.
Richard will provide a summary of the proposals on the LCCiH mailing list and invite responses.
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6. Hackney
Local Implementation Plan
Hackney's draft Local
Implementation Plan is a substantial document in a number of separate
parts. Key sections of interest to LCC are the Cycling Action
Plan, Road Safety Plan and Hackney’s Sustainable Transport
Strategy. Deadline is 31st August.
Action: David F. and Richard will
meet to discuss a response to the strategy. Others are also invited to
be involved in a working group.
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7. Windus
streets for people / 'home zone' / one-way system
The Windus 'streets for
people' project is in danger of becoming a farce. We were amazed to be
informed recently by officers that the commitment to the preservation
of two-way cycling given in the consultation and in all previous
discussions had come to nothing, and the scheme now appears to be
nothing more than a one-way system imposed over standard 20mph zone
features.
We have stated to the officers
that this is absolutely unacceptable and clearly in breach of both the
consultation and of the basis on which the funding was supplied by TfL.
This is a fundamental issue to us. We cannot allow a project which was
funded specifically to improve conditions for walking and cycling to
result in the removal of the right to cycle in both directions on more
than half a dozen residential streets.
Action: Trevor and Oliver will
continue to liaise with Adrian McWhinnie and other officers and
councillors, making it clear that cycle permeability is
non-negotiable, and that the London Cycling Campaign in Hackney will do
everything in its power to defend two-way cycling in these streets. A
report will be made to the August meeting.
8. Report
on Lower Clapton traffic management review
Tim reported that
the Lower Clapton Review produced by the Council’s consultants
has produced the following ‘shopping list’ of measures:
- 20mph zones
- Speed tables
in place of cushions on Powerscroft Road
- No plans or
ideas for Powerscroft Road southern end
Tim pointed out to Steve Walker that not all of the mode filters admit
cycles – action was promised on this.
The proposed remodelling of the Chatsworth Road / Lea Bridge Road
junction should incorporate cyclists’ needs, especially those of
cyclists emerging from the parks. The Council is reluctant to remodel
one-way roads; it is feared that residents will resist false one-ways
due to problems of enforcement; Tim is not impressed by the consultants
but thinks that Steve Walker may come up with more robust ideas; Phase
1 of the review (consultation) has been completed. Plenty of residents
wanted car-friendly measures and attacked the behaviour of cyclists;
Problems identified include problems created by lack of capacity for
motors on Lower Clapton Road, therefore a perceived problem with
measures to reduce capacity for traffic using Chatsworth Road as a
cut-through.
9. Upper
Clapton Sustainable Development Plan
Oliver is preparing
a response which will be circulated for comment.
10. Any
other business
Olu thanked us for
our recent leafleting session on the towpath of the Lee Navigation at
High Hill Ferry, where we distributed leaflets reminding cyclists of
the need to ride with care and consideration for other users. (There
have been complaints of furious cycling and even of collisions at this
location).
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Next meeting
Wednesday 3 August 2005, 8pm, Marcon
Court Estate Community Hall, E8.
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