Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Please Help Us Raise £700 to Fund a Leaflet Printrun
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
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by DavidJ on
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I agree that what we really need are some very radical measures to massively reduce car use in cities. We need road charging and perhaps even the banning of the kind of commuting you note above.
The problem is - when will this happen? Despite all the evidence about the damage that pollution, and car dependence, does to our health and our environment - nothing is done.
Why is nothing done? Because no politician wants to face the hostility that we see on here when people's right to drive when and where they want is threatened.
Meanwhile. slowly, incrementally, local measures on roads do make a difference - the kinds of schemes that are all around us (Michael Anderson's map might be helpful to see again). Yes they do make life less convenient for people who want to use their cars. But isn't that the point really?
How long can we wait for the big solutions?
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Permalink Reply by John D on
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It's hopeless David. I have already suggested on here a simple method of cutting private motoring by 50% (fuel rationing ) but nobody wants to know.
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Permalink Reply by JoeW on
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How would rationing achieve an equitable outcome John? Warham has 5X the traffic of Seymour, Wightman has 6X the traffic of Warham, and yet all three roads are the same carriageway width, the same residential density, the same distance from your living room or bedroom window to the road. The same manifest unsuitability to carrying more than a few hundred vehicles per day.
I can't see it being practical to cut Wightman traffic by 90% using just fuel rationing. Certainly far simpler just to change to the road layout.
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I'm thinking of the whole country, Joe. Not just a couple of streets in Harringay. But if all our streets see a 50% fall, isn't that equitable ?
If Wightman is filtered and 90% of the present traffic is forced onto Green Lanes, is that equitable ?
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Fuel rationing would not equalise traffic (Warham would still be 5X Seymour etc.), and it would not rationalise traffic (it would still use minor roads instead of the intended A-roads).
When Wightman was filtered during the bridgeworks, the volume of traffic on Wightman decreased by 90%, but the percentage changes on GL were only +8% by Effingham, +12% by Duckett, and GL traffic actually decreased by -2% by the Arena.
So over 90,000 fewer vehicle movements per week at every point on Wightman, and only 17,000 more even on the business part of GL. So filtering Wightman (plus mitigating measures to ensure the extra 12% on GL and other A-roads does not impact bus and other journey reliability) is a far simpler and more effective way to achieve the objectives than rationing fuel across the whole country.
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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John, I've just been listening to an item on the Today programme about the government's decision to delay lower emissions legislation. The bloke from the motor manufacturers was adamant that even if it was brought in there would need to be expemptions for non domestic vehicles (I.e. everything but cars) and that even for cars the the run up to implementing the new rules would need to be many years. Those kinds of lobbies have a huge influence on government policy so I for one am not willing to wait lord knows how long for countrywide solution to be put in place.
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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And there will be self driving electric cars on London's roads by 2019. :)
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Permalink Reply by Antoinette on
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What about the inconvenience caused to public transport users though. They are doing the right thing but will be negatively impacted by the closure of Wightman. If you want a "big solution" to car use, my suggestion would be to tax parking to a prohibitively high level. Make workplace parking a taxable benefit. Refuse planning permission for any development which includes parking for anyone other than the disabled.
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There is a bus lane on Green Lanes, we can have more of those. Perhaps remove parking from Turnpike Lane (again it is mainly used by shop owners who have turned the mews areas behind their shops which were for supply into flats so, no sympathy) and put a bus lane there. How about fixing up the Lordship Lane/Roundway junction so that it doesn't filter so much traffic down Westbury Ave and instead leaves more of it waiting at the lights/contemplating the train?
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Don you're making the mistake of assuming that Traffic is some fixed quantity which has to go on one road or another. Traffic is actually the outcome of people's decisions (local economist Frederick Guy says it more eloquently here). Filtering roads - or if you prefer, "closing" them to rat-runners - encourages people to make different decisions. The filtered roads become safer and more pleasant to walk and cycle on, so some people choose that. The rat-runners are forced onto possibly slower or longer primary routes, so some of them may choose alternative modes. I'm not saying there's no need for macro solutions - congestion charging, petrol rationing, investment in public transport, trams, etc. But while traffic is still free to cut through minor roads the problem is hidden and the authorities will defer tackling the macro solutions.
If we don't support filtering, the traffic will increase, and the council will just say that's what we asked for.
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Joe: Even accepting that some traffic was discouraged from travelling through Harringay last year, you yourself say that there were an additional 17,000 vehicle movements on Green Lanes, a road that’s chocker most of the time anyway, so surely my point about displacement still has validity? Traffic diminished on Wightman but the brunt of the change fell on GL. The danger is if stats are an average; maybe there was no increase in GL traffic at all at 4am, but during peak times - ie when most people need to travel for work, business or school - the impact was horrendous. I didn’t make up TfL’s figures for the huge increases in bus journey times and my experience, along with that of many, many others, was that trying to use public transport while Wightman was closed was a nightmare. This isn’t just about discouraging the use of private cars, it’s about the impact of road closures on what most campaigners would consider a viable form of transport - buses.
You also comment that “rat-runners are forced onto possibly slower or longer primary routes” - which in Harringay’s case means GL! I don’t know if you’re an exemplary citizen who walks and cycles everywhere and never, ever uses a car, but I’d be prepared to bet that many of the Wightman and Ladder residents who urge the full closure solution have no qualms about using side roads (aka “rat-runs”) when they’re travelling outside the area; right-turn from Endymion into Florence or Victoria to avoid those pesky traffic lights at Stroud Green, anyone? London’s a complex web of roads which were mostly not built to cope with current volumes of traffic and one person’s short-cut is someone else’s rat-run. This doesn’t mean there aren’t problems for residents on individual roads, but does suggest that an overall examination of transport and work patterns and, in particular, public transport provision, is needed, rather than piecemeal tweaking.
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I think you need to look at some of the historical photos of Harringay we have on here. Roads were not built for cars.
Anyway, this is all moot, you'll be dragged from your polluting hatchbacks by angry mothers and insurance company executives before the decade is out. I look forward to watching you cry over your bonnet and the money you have to pay to scrap your vehicle.
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