Harringay online

Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

For those of you who are active on HoL, you'll be very much aware of Haringey Council's transport study. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for all Harringay's residents to have their say on how best to reduce our excessive traffic burden. To that end, we want to ensure that all residents are FULLY informed on the options available.

Unlike Haringey Council, we do not have a juggernaut PR system pushing our message, or the money to pay for it. So we are asking for your help. We want to raise money to fund a print run of leaflets for Wightman and all the Ladder roads, plus other events to raise awareness.

If you'd like to help us raise funds for the second phase of our campaign; to create a safer, healthier, happier Harringay for everyone, then please click the link below which will take you to our Just Giving page.

Thank you.

Yes, I would like to help raise £700 to fund leaflets If you'd like more information, or get involved, please check out our Living Wightman Blog or Facebook Page.

Tags for Forum Posts: harringay traffic study, traffic

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John: Your (maybe sarcastic) tweaking of my original post actually reinforces the point I'm making. Apart from the political interference issue, of which I have no knowledge, I'd agree with your re-write: closing the Gardens and Hermitage undoubtedly increased the traffic using Green Lanes by removing alternative routes.

Living Wightman have said they don't want to reopen the Gardens but advocate (OK, not "impose") closing Wightman and Ladder roads. During last year's Wightman closure there were numerous threads and posts on the subject; because LW is a group of people, some of whom may also post under their own names, it's often difficult to know who is speaking on their own account and who as a representative, which is why I referred to "some HoL participants" in my original post. But among the plethora of comments, many condemned Gardens residents for perceived selfishness in achieving road closures, and your latest post also suggests possible political motivation. Thus my question remains: if closure of the Gardens is to be condemned, why is it now OK for the same solution to be proposed for Wightman and the Ladder? Displaced traffic from Wightman has to go somewhere (even with a projected 8% reduction) and last year showed that it went to GL, with disastrous results.

A Chetwynd Road-type chicane looks like a good idea; it already operates on Woodlands Park, apparently effectively (all the lorries come up Glenwood instead) but I don't see it being proposed for Wightman or the Ladder - and would it be practicable, given the need for access by dustcarts and Ocado deliveries? 

And for what it's worth, this is what I thought would be fair and justice - what they have on Chetwynd Rd.

I've been advocating some such on numerous threads before now, but it never seemed to get much traction.
I still think it is the answer though.

Hi Don - there is some analysis of the volume of "through traffic" on this thread here, based on the ANPR data of vehicles recorded entering on one side of the study area and leaving (or not) on another.

I haven't seen any "condemnation of the Gardens solution" from Living WIghtman by the way - in fact the post above makes it clear that they don't support re-opening any roads.

Did you mean Harringay or Haringey in your earlier post - Harringay (the ward) actually is more or less co-terminous with the Ladder.

Joe: I meant Harringay - not the whole borough or the ward, but what I understand to be roughly HoL's boundaries (and those of the traffic study), between Turnpike Lane and Endymion north to south and Wightman to Black Boy Lane/Warwick Gardens west to east.

I acknowledged that LW doesn't want the Gardens reopened, but as I've just said in another response it can be difficult to differentiate group members of LW from individual posters, especially on last year's numerous Wightman closure threads, and many of them condemned the Gardens solution; that's why I originally referred to "some HoL participants".

I've looked at your referenced post and also the traffic study, which says "the exact origins and destinations of vehicles using each individual road are not known". I'd suggest this underlines one of the points I originally made: a large number of advocates for Wightman closure complain about "through traffic" but nobody actually knows what proportion of it originates or ends in the immediate area. So what is "local" traffic? I think "local" is anyone in the Harringay area I outlined, but I get the strong impression that some Wightman and Ladder residents draw the boundary extremely narrowly around their own streets. Thanks to not driving and also having dodgy knees, I don't cycle but walk locally and also use buses a lot; but sometimes I take a cab from the cab office opposite the Salisbury to Crouch End or Camden and, yes, it uses Allison, Wightman and Endymion roads as necessary. Is that "local" or "through" traffic? 

Don, Living Wightman have consistently supported the road barriers in the Gardens and at Hermitage. We believe that protecting groups of residential roads in this way is the way forward and should slowly be rolled out across Haringey.

We believe extending what the Gardens and Hermitage have to the ladder is the fair and right way forward.

The traffic consultants employed by Haringey Council found that most of the traffic along Wightman did not start nor finish in the study area, so there is evidence that the largest problem is caused by through traffic.

We are not anti car, they are very useful and vital for a small number of people, but we do want the 40% of local people who own a car to use their cars as little as possible, including ourselves. As you imply everytime we use a car it has a negative effect on other people in terms of pollution, noise, safety.

Creating more areas where it is pleasant and safe to walk or use a bike will encourage people to leave their car at home. Filtering Wightman Road will turn a terrible environment with illegal levels of pollution into a place which residents and others can use safely.  

There is plenty of evidence from the traffic consultants and in our document 'Fresh start' which you and others can read  here, which shows that filtering Wightman will make more than 8% of traffic 'disappear' as vehicle users choose to not use their car for their journey, combine journeys or not to make the journey in the first place. Pollution actually decreased on Green Lanes during the bridge works.

We accept that the traffic was worse at certain times of the day, in certain places (e.g. Turnpike Lane)  which is why we want filtering combined with mitigating measures, so the buses in particular move more easily. We have listed ideas in 'Fresh Start', but we need Haringey Council and the traffic experts to work on what the best measures are to put in place. 

You personally Karen may not be anti-car, but many of your brethren are very much anti-car....unreservedly so
I don't really understand what you mean by 'filtering'. If you mean some sort of barrier system which only allows residents in, this does feel a little selfish to visitors (like me) and damaging to the few businesses you have there.

As a Tottenham resident who lives in a one-way rat run (Broadwater Road) and now has close family living on Wightman Road, may I strongly recommend that you do NOT opt for one way traffic, in either direction! There are NO advantages whatsoever for residents. I have first hand experience that one-way significantly increase the speed of traffic. And it encourages the occasional mindless thugs who simply floor-it down the road.

I don't understand why it is that with the whole of Haringey now officially a 20mph zone, nothing is done anywhere to enforce that speed limit. However, the council is quick to snatch fortunes off of us for parking our cars near our homes, or allowing our friends to drive by and visit. Surely, the answer for that road and my own is for the council to spend some of the fortunes they take off us for CPZ fees in calming our streets.

I was myself recently fined for going 27mph in Lee Bridge Road, Hackney. Naughty I know but i never drive at excessive speed and genuinely didn't notice the signs. I think in part because I'm so used to living in a borough where they have the same rules but nobody, ever, takes a blind bit of notice because there is no enforcement. I'm campaigning for imorovements in my own street so I wish you luck and will watch with interest! I 'll let you know if I learn anything useful at my impending 'speed awareness' course!

Council policy is against creating resident's only roads i.e, where the residents have a badge or electronic fob allowing only them in.

Filtering Wightman by placing physical barriers along it would stop vehicles using it as a rat-run but still allow residents (and their visitors and deliveries and tradesmen etc.) to access whichever bit of Wightman they wanted by driving up one of the Ladder rungs from Green Lanes. Anyone could drive up and down the rungs without a badge or special swipecard or electronic fob; but it would eliminate ratrunning since obviously only the residents (such as your family) and their visitors (such as yourself) would bother.

The benefit is obviously huge for anyone living on Wightman and the Ladder rungs which currently suffers over 16,000 vehicles every day, most of it through traffic with absolutely no business in the area.

Please can you guys stop being disingenuous, filtering is defacto, closing Wightman. And turning each pair of ladder roads into a cul de sac.
If that's what you want, go for it. But please stop trying to kid everyone that Wightman will remain "open" to anyone other than you who live there.

Interestingly my daughter , came harring back out of the gardens today after walking 200 metres down the road thinking it would be an easy pedestrian shortcut. she's 14 and found it too scary - no one around, no passing cars, really really quiet... She said she's never using the gardens alone again.
I'm guessing that's what she'll think about the ladder once it's been gated, sorry, I mean filtered.

Filtering and closing are different Andy.

There will be lots of road closures tomorrow for the London marathon. There will be no cars or vans etc or even bicycles on those roads even if they belong to residents or their visitors or deliveries or tradespersons.

A filtered Wightman will be accessible to motor vehicles, but the road layout will be such that there will be no reason for motor vehicles to be there unless they belong to, or have business with, residents.

Your splitting hairs,
It will be closed. To me and a whole pile of others in this area.
I have no problem with you advocating for a closed road.
But speak plainly,
You don't want "Others" using the ladder to access any other part of London (but reserve the right for yourselves to use everywhere else) -- unless I'm yet another Amazon/Acado driver spewing out diesel fumes down my road to deliver your new sling backs/ veg /duvet cover or satellite wok.
So -- IT'LL BE CLOSED.
Speak plainly. And stop the waffle,
If you want a closed Wightman, fine , but say so. Let everyone know that's your aim. And stop the Bolockary.

And before you have a pop - I don't approve of the gardens being closed either..
My god! the place is turning into Milton Keynes without the concrete cows or the roundabouts...

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