Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Really P****d Off
I hope all you who have the vote in Harringay will remember tonight ( and certainly other nights to come ) and at the next election vote out the incompetent shower responsible for the introduction of the LTN.
My weekly 5-minute journey from Wightman Road to Green Lanes took 45 minutes, including 30 minutes to go the length of Hampden Road. Yes, I know that there was a burst water main. But in happier times traffic would have been distributed across the roads now blocked off and not confined to Green Lanes. Yes, I know that I could have taken a bus to sit in the same traffic jam as I did this evening but in any case there aren't any buses between my house and the bottom of Effingham Road.
I understand the concerns of those residents living in the LTN who hope that the pollution in their streets will be reduced but don't the residents of Green Lanes, Turnpike Lane and Wightman Road breathe ? don't their children have lungs ?. Where did the Council think the LTN traffic would go ?
And please don't suggest to this disabled person that I could have cycled. I couldn't.
Tags for Forum Posts: low traffic neighbourhoods, traffic
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by ab123 on
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The LTNs are designed to encourage people to use the alternative methods. We have two undergrounds, over four direct to central bus lines, and two overgrounds within a 1 mi stretch on GL. LTN philosophy is telling people to walk to your nearest transit as most people definitely do not have to commute via car to central everyday. that's a myth.
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Absolutely. I can just about see driving to work off you are going from Green Lanes to Watford for eg but anywhere within London not so much.
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Allegra — Two points: first, bus services are as good as the traffic will allow, so if extra traffic forced onto GL slows them to a crawl they are de facto far less appealling (even without the, for now, slightly-rescinded overall TfL cuts to services). Secondly, if, as I understand it, traffic surveys point very, very strongly to Harringay’s traffic problems stemming primarily from traffic originating outside the borough — ie Herts, Essex, Enfield, etc, — not from internal borough car movements, which are the tip of the iceberg. If so, commuters from outer London and neighbouring counties aren’t going to be influenced by buses, tubes or Overground in Harringay, hence my arguments in other posts here for GL needing to be the primary focus of attention, not side roads — and my perhaps not-entirely-serious suggestion of a campaign urging those in the outer areas to walk or cycle into central London. Probably not a message likely to be received well in Enfield, New Barnet or Potters Bar, for example.
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I still don't see why someone from Potters Bar or Enfield or New Barnet wont get on a perfectly ok train from those places into central London.
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Permalink Reply by JulieB on
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This is what I never understand, where are all these people parking in central London, there surely can't be enough spaces for all of them.
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Julie — Who knows? But there must be somewhere or why are they driving through (not to) Harringay? The council’s LTN csse is predicated on the curse of Waze sending drivers to “rat-run” through streets that — in my 30-year experience of St Ann’s — are actually some of the quietest in London, so the vehicles must be going to/coming from somewhere. Many commenters on here blame commuter traffic from outer London, Essex, Herts, etc, but I don’t know if this can be substantiated; perhaps they’re all on a mission from Hackney to Barnet or v/v….? This problem needs to be dealt with at source and in Green Lanes, not in the side streets.
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Elizabeth — I’d agree with you about choosing train over car (not least as I don’t drive), but apparently thousands of others don’t. What I’m trying to say is that the bulk of the problem emanates outside Harringay, not inside. LTNs primarily make life difficult, time-consuming and inconvenient for local residents, forcing more traffic onto major roads that are already crowded and sacrificing the wellbeing of those living on so-called “boundary roads” for the benefit of the enclaves within. But the major problem of through traffic starts miles away. Telling Harringay residents to walk or cycle isn’t going to deal with the root causes, so sorting out Green Lanes should be the priority because that will give the most effective help. I don’t have stats for traffic that doesn’t originate in the borough, but I’m sure there are many on here who do; I’ve always read, on various HoL threads, that the biggest throughput in the area is commuter traffic from elsewhere, so isn’t that where to start?
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Can you see the carpark in this map, just south of Harringay off Tollington?
That's a school, the carpark is usually full during school hours. Do you think they pay for that parking? There are lots of other examples.
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Don, one of the main impacts of an LTN is that it discourages through traffic. The current congestion is caused because traffic passing through the borough can't cut through the LTNs, so they are forced onto the main artery roads. The result of this is that they are (a) discouraged by the car use and choose another, greener mode of transport, which is more likely for local residents (b) independently choose another route to avoid the congestion or (c) are taken another route by their satnavs avoiding the congestion on the snarled up main artery road. This is a logic that few people who are anti-LTN seem to grasp, while showing little respect for the evidence of this proven by established LTNs across the world. You can't stop journeys starting and ending outside of Haringey, but you can do something about it when they get here.
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You constantly say that the public transport isn't good enough for those who live in/near the LTNs but I just don't think that is true.
London has, by far, the best public transport in the UK and pretty frequently rated top ten in the world. There may be certain journeys that are difficult or accessibility issues but, for the majority, it's not as if taking public transport is a great hardship.
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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I’m originally from the north east and often go back to visit. The Tyne and Wear metro has about the same coverage as London overground and is less frequent, half or even hourly bus services are common, different operators only accept certain tickets and it costs far more to travel compared to London
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Michael would you consider saying a little about changes you've seen in the Tyne and Wear Metro over the years?.
In the mid 1980's I did some participatory research with a family support team in the poorer West End of Newcastle. As I remember, the "Transfare" system seemed very cheap and convenient. I recall one journey Bus+metro to Whitley Bay to interview someone. Later seeing some women who'd caught the same bus with kids and pushchairs in the sunshine at the sea front.
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