Low traffic neighbourhoods (and school streets) |
Low traffic neighbourhoods (and school streets) |
Fri, 18 Sep 2020 - 19:59
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#1
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Member Group: Members Posts: 23,582 Joined: 12 Feb 2013 From: London Member No.: 59,924 |
Thought I'd kick off a thought thread on these as we have a lot incoming, initially from Hammersmith.
- H&F is a smart scheme in that it uses ANPR to allow registered access (like some school streets). It is a small scheme. - H&F may exercise discretion for early PCNs - Hackney LTNs are huge and have caused massive blowback from locals but I'd say they'll be well supported by at least half of locals. No camera enforcement yet but huge queues on bordering A and B roads. - Islington less ambitious but Canonbury East and West in play with live cameras in East. Arlington extension, St Mary's St Peter's also in play. - Wandsworth has aready removed some LTN restrictions in Tooting but evidence of immediate snarl ups on side streets and no better congestion on main roads. - A lot of the new restrictions are temporary planters/oil cans under experimental TMOs but some are conversions of width restrictions with existing cameras and also new lockable bollards (which would only allow m/c illegally through). - School streets - I've included these as Hackney for example is extending them to 40 and more schools and they also impact LTNs. - The orders for Hackney (or notification) at least are in the Gazette - what details do we need? This post has been edited by stamfordman: Fri, 18 Sep 2020 - 21:12 |
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Fri, 18 Sep 2020 - 19:59
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Mon, 26 Jul 2021 - 17:23
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#361
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,306 Joined: 4 Mar 2017 Member No.: 90,659 |
Can you imagine the outrage if people on road bikes were tearing along the red ways at 30mph?
Doesn't take much imagination as even on wide, segregated paths anything above 7mph will see you branded as aggressive. Roads through built up areas inevitably involves measures that delay journey times. Otherwise there would be no NSL, pedestrian crossings, and we'd turn all pavements into extra road space. There are benefits to active travel even if you never walk or cycle. We are the fattest nation in Europe and it costs the NHS a bomb out if your taxes to pay for it. Type 2 diabetes is about £1bn. We routinely now have patients with BMI >60 requiring special equipment to be hired and four nurses to move them in bed. All coming out of your taxes, fuel duty etc |
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Mon, 26 Jul 2021 - 18:44
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#362
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,074 Joined: 17 Nov 2015 Member No.: 80,686 |
Can you imagine the outrage if people on road bikes were tearing along the red ways at 30mph? Doesn't take much imagination as even on wide, segregated paths anything above 7mph will see you branded as aggressive. Roads through built up areas inevitably involves measures that delay journey times. Otherwise there would be no NSL, pedestrian crossings, and we'd turn all pavements into extra road space. There are benefits to active travel even if you never walk or cycle. We are the fattest nation in Europe and it costs the NHS a bomb out if your taxes to pay for it. Type 2 diabetes is about £1bn. We routinely now have patients with BMI >60 requiring special equipment to be hired and four nurses to move them in bed. All coming out of your taxes, fuel duty etc Do you mean road cycles or motorbikes? We have our share of lycra louts who do just that and expect their 'right of way' and that's legal. Of course there are bebefits to active travel and today's obesity challenges are as much about food choices, TV advertising, body images, closure of facilities and numerous other things than active travel: I seldom see fat cyclists. What the Govt directs the NHS to provide with our taxes is beyond my control and whole different debate. Suffice it to say some of the NHS current spend would stop if I was 'in charge' but that's not for here. Precious few of the BMI 60> people will be scared of using a bicycle on the roads apart from maybe whether the frame is strong enough. |
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Mon, 26 Jul 2021 - 20:34
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#363
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,306 Joined: 4 Mar 2017 Member No.: 90,659 |
The thing is if you don't encourage active travel, what do you do? Chips are cheap. Sports facilities are expensive. Dedicated cycle lanes are expensive. Repurposing existing streets costs almost nothing.
The only difference to the previous favourite of local authorities - painting a 30cm wide cycle lane down the side of a road and patting themselves on the back for having installed another kilometre of cycle friendly road - is that LTNs are actually effective at making streets easier to cycle. Most of the treatment for morbidly obese patients isn't optional. If someone has a grade 4 pressure sore from lying in bed all day, it will cost you at least £10k to treat. Bariatric surgery itself does have fairly strict parameters about max BMI etc. The big saving would be if you left hospital when you are medically fit to do so as in most of the rest of the world rather than sitting in a bed for months refusing all the care options given to you. But that's not going to happen any time soon because there would be lots of sad face photos in the papers because someone was put in a care home in the next town over from the one they wanted. In an ideal world there would be money for a MK-style cycle path network in all cities and dog walkers would keep their dog on a lead when using them. But back in the real world, you're choosing from a bunch of bad options. |
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Mon, 26 Jul 2021 - 20:54
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#364
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Member Group: Members Posts: 29,263 Joined: 16 Jan 2008 Member No.: 16,671 |
Roads through built up areas inevitably involves measures that delay journey times. The thing is if you don't encourage active travel, what do you do? Why do you discount drastically reducing motor traffic, which is what we really need to do, from which all else can follow? And please don't repeat your claim that LTNs achieve that. The DfT figs for road traffic, that you queried, are freely available, as I suspect you well know. -------------------- |
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Tue, 27 Jul 2021 - 07:09
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#365
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,074 Joined: 17 Nov 2015 Member No.: 80,686 |
. But back in the real world, you're choosing from a bunch of bad options. Yes indeed, but from this thread alone we can see that opinions vary in respect of the 'least worst', with none being automatically correct. For any bad option to prevail it needs to be properly thought through, properly and legally consulted upon and effectively rolled out. LTNs seem to have fallen at the 1st (2nd and 3rd!). It's a political football...with spikes and thus our politicians make lots of noise (for votes) but kick the ball into the long grass (mixing metaphors big time here!) until the next parliament or local authority change-out. My own view is that I see no sense at all in promoting walking/cycling whilst throwing money at road improvements for buses, paying silly money to train drivers and encouraging motor manufacturers to make every 'better' cars/vans etc which are 'safer' (and therefore bigger, heavier, less efficient etc) The average person probably doesn't really care, but even those who do must wonder how they're meant to actually get around, to the shops, work, gym etc? Mixed messages, few with compelling facts behind them. I'll stick with 4.4 V8 petrol and boycott LTNs! |
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Fri, 30 Jul 2021 - 06:56
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#366
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,306 Joined: 4 Mar 2017 Member No.: 90,659 |
The DfT figs for road traffic, that you queried, are freely available, as I suspect you well know. You keep saying this. It's a pretty weak argument to say "somewhere on the internet there is proof". Somewhere on the internet there are people "proving" the earth is flat. Maybe you could link to these figures or even better some analysis of them seeing as I'm not a traffic engineer. It's not as good as peer reviewed studies, but it would be a start. |
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Sat, 31 Jul 2021 - 00:42
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#367
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Member Group: Members Posts: 29,263 Joined: 16 Jan 2008 Member No.: 16,671 |
The DfT figs for road traffic, that you queried, are freely available, as I suspect you well know. You keep saying this. It's a pretty weak argument to say "somewhere on the internet there is proof". Somewhere on the internet there are people "proving" the earth is flat. Maybe you could link to these figures or even better some analysis of them seeing as I'm not a traffic engineer. It's not as good as peer reviewed studies, but it would be a start. It's much more solid than cherry picked data in Goodman/Aldred studies. It is hard officiaL Govt. data. If you want to continue denying it exists (and very easy to find) then carry on kidding yourself. I will not respond to your 'denial' games. Have an example. Motor vehicle traffic increased by 11+% in London, 2015 - 2019. Do you also deny that is true? This post has been edited by Neil B: Sat, 31 Jul 2021 - 15:06 -------------------- |
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Sun, 1 Aug 2021 - 17:43
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#368
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Member Group: Closed Posts: 9,710 Joined: 28 Mar 2007 Member No.: 11,355 |
"Motor vehicle traffic increased by 11+% in London, 2015 - 2019".
Time to do away with bus lanes? The concept has always intrigued me since it ties up a valuable resource. It would fail any cost benefit analysis IMO. In business, a director would want to know why an asset was only used 20%-40% of its time. As long as Councils see bus lanes as a revenue stream----fines---fines----fines they will never look at clogged traffic flows, more pollution and better ways of managing traffic by freeing up bus lanes. Even if we can't abolish bus lanes with the widespread use of CCTV why aren't operators able to use variable message signs to open up bus lanes when most needed? You would not get as much arterial congestion on the road network then we could all have a good moan when more LTNs are introduced. Mick |
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Sun, 1 Aug 2021 - 18:08
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#369
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Member Group: Members Posts: 23,582 Joined: 12 Feb 2013 From: London Member No.: 59,924 |
Even if we can't abolish bus lanes with the widespread use of CCTV why aren't operators able to use variable message signs to open up bus lanes when most needed? A lot of bus lanes are only operational in peak hours in the direction of commuter traffic. You know this. They are 'most needed' for buses not SUVs with one driver and no passenger. Also, most bus lanes also allow taxis. This post has been edited by stamfordman: Sun, 1 Aug 2021 - 18:10 |
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Sun, 1 Aug 2021 - 22:02
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#370
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,306 Joined: 4 Mar 2017 Member No.: 90,659 |
If you want to continue denying it exists (and very easy to find) then carry on kidding yourself. If it is so easy to find I'd imagine you'd have provided it. No, I haven't got time to try and guess what to search for on labyrinthine government websites. The concept has always intrigued me since it ties up a valuable resource. What valuable resource? Bus lanes almost always approach a bottleneck, to get them to the front of the queue. If you remove a lane you might make the queue twice as long, but a finite number of cars can get through. If you make incentivise bus journeys by making them quicker than driving (along with cyclists and motorcycles), who are much more efficient users of this "valuable resource", then you can reduce journey times for everyone because 40 passengers on a bus takes less time to travel through a junction than 40 cars. Even if the bus lane wasn't there the bus stops still would be, making the road de facto one lane on most busy routes anyway. |
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Mon, 2 Aug 2021 - 08:06
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#371
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Member Group: Members Posts: 972 Joined: 9 Oct 2016 Member No.: 87,665 |
Getting rid of bus lanes would reduce congestion in the short term. But over the years, traffic would continue to increase and you’d be back to the same congestion levels eventually. Then what? Find another quick fix to add a little capacity? Maybe open up the LTNs, and spread the traffic more evenly throughout the streets, until they all fill up too. Then what? Another quick fix. Then what?
Bus lanes, LTNs, etc. aren’t the solution. But getting rid of them isn’t the solution either. You solve congestion either by increasing capacity or decreasing demand, and increasing capacity is simply not a sustainable solution. That only leaves one option. As the great W.O.P.R. once said, the only winning move is not to play. |
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Mon, 2 Aug 2021 - 08:40
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#372
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,074 Joined: 17 Nov 2015 Member No.: 80,686 |
Getting rid of bus lanes would reduce congestion in the short term. But over the years, traffic would continue to increase and you’d be back to the same congestion levels eventually. Then what? Find another quick fix to add a little capacity? Maybe open up the LTNs, and spread the traffic more evenly throughout the streets, until they all fill up too. Then what? Another quick fix. Then what? Bus lanes, LTNs, etc. aren’t the solution. But getting rid of them isn’t the solution either. You solve congestion either by increasing capacity or decreasing demand, and increasing capacity is simply not a sustainable solution. That only leaves one option. As the great W.O.P.R. once said, the only winning move is not to play. You're right - mostly. But the actual solution is to reduce the need to travel - less city centre offices would be a start? It seems as soon as companies move out of towns, others back-fill. London is the best worst example. |
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Mon, 2 Aug 2021 - 15:17
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#373
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Member Group: Members Posts: 29,263 Joined: 16 Jan 2008 Member No.: 16,671 |
If you want to continue denying it exists (and very easy to find) then carry on kidding yourself. If it is so easy to find I'd imagine you'd have provided it. No, I haven't got time to try and guess what to search for on labyrinthine government websites. More like a simple Google of the most obvious phrase. But irrespective, surely you're not denying motor traffic has hugely increased are you? -------------------- |
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Mon, 2 Aug 2021 - 20:56
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#374
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Member Group: Members Posts: 3,306 Joined: 4 Mar 2017 Member No.: 90,659 |
But irrespective, surely you're not denying motor traffic has hugely increased are you? Not hugely. Over the last 20 years population has increased by 15%, kilometres driven by 21%. So 6% increase per year. That's excluding last year of course when traffic was down 5% on 2001 levels. Obviously some of that will come back but at least around here traffic is much reduced at rush hour. Here's the link to save you Googling. https://drive.google.com/file/d/14qLZPy1RbT...iew?usp=sharing |
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Mon, 2 Aug 2021 - 22:32
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#375
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Member Group: Members Posts: 972 Joined: 9 Oct 2016 Member No.: 87,665 |
You're right - mostly. But the actual solution is to reduce the need to travel - less city centre offices would be a start? It seems as soon as companies move out of towns, others back-fill. London is the best worst example. Thanks, I think. But that’s exactly my point - Reduce demand. |
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