In case it's escaped your notice or slipped your mind, Wightman Road will be closed to through traffic for five months starting next Tuesday 29th March.
This will be a significant dislocation to North London traffic movement. So much so that warning notices have been placed as far away as Archway. No doubt it will also have a significant impact on Harringay's traffic.
However, there really is no alternative to at least partial road closure. The railway bridge between Alroy and Wightman roads is being replaced and there will simply be no road for a few months!
One option the Council could have taken would have been to simply reroute the traffic via the Ladder rung roads. It is to their credit, however, they recognised that with over 16,000 vehicles a day using Wightman Road, this would have placed an intolerable burden on our narrow residential roads, already beset by undue traffic volumes.
After consultation with residents, the solution decided upon is to place blocks at regular intervals along Wightman Road, in effect creating clusters of two or three rung roads. Whilst this will retain unfettered access for residents. it will render the whole Ladder, including Wightman, useless as a rat run. You can clearly see the details on the full size pdf map attached below.
Quite what it will mean for traffic in Harringay, Haringey and further afield remains to be seen. Those of us who have been working with the Council on this very much hope that traffic will quickly find other routes. It's fair to say, however, that at very best, we're going to experience some very heavy congestion on Green Lanes for a month or so.
At the same time, the Harringay traffic study will continue. The coincident timing of this piece of work with the bridge closure may be fortunate in that it will give the consultants an opportunity to study the outcome of diverting traffic away from Harringay.
A pdf copy of the Wightman Road closure is attached, along with some Council-produced documentation. You can stay up to date with what's happening on the Wightman Road closure on a dedicated page on the council website here.
Tags for Forum Posts: traffic, wightman bridge, wightman bridge closure
I'm unashamedly smug about being able to cycle the length of Wightman without the usual intimidation and aggression. However I noticed this evening that pedestrians still have to deal with only having half a pavement because of the cars still parked on them. Bit of a bum deal.
Seeing as there's so little other traffic between now and Sept wouldn't it be a good idea if cars were parked on the road, where they're supposed to be? I appreciate that owners can't suddenly start doing this because they'll be ticketed immediately, but the council should be able to make it temporarily official.
Trudy and I live in Wightman Road. This evening about 8pm we drove down to the Arena car park - this took 5 mins. Had a fish supper at Hashtag fish and chips. Then went to Sainsburys to do the big weekly shop. Left Saiinsbury's at 9.30pm. No queue at the check out, no queue to get out onto Green Lanes but slower than usual to get back to our turning (Allison). Home by 9.45pm.
Earlier in the day, about 1pm I had driven to the Sunshine Garden Centre to collect some fencing. I went via Wood Green to cross the railway near Ally Pally station. This took about 5 minutes longer than usual. The return journey was difficult along Station Road and because of the no right turn onto Green Lanes but otherwise the traffic seemed pretty normal.
We are very hesitant to use the car at all except during such off-peak hours and we try to avoid Priory Road and Turnpike Lane entirely. I am told also that the road over Ally Pally is often nose to tail.
Thanks to Hugh's suggestion, I find a look at Google's traffic map is helpful. Today it showed that the easiest way from the ladder to the north circular was Green Lanes, West Green Road, Belmont Road, Downhills Way, The Roundway, A10 - only a slight variation on my normal route but avoiding crawling traffic on Westbury Avenue.
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