Bus Lane Defeated
Discussion
Barnet Council is now licking its wounds after having to cancel a bus lane.
https://www.barnet.gov.uk/news/barnet-council-call...
TL/DR: Council lied, saying that the bus lane was to make bus services better when it was actually to make car use worse.
The council started building a bus lane on Regents Park Road in Finchley on August 15th. This pretty much immediately led to residents rebelling, saying it was unnecessary, dangerous and the removal of parking would be a nightmare for those who lived on the street and local shops.
The council insisted that it was not an anti-car measure and was purely to improve the speed of the bus service and in doing so encourage people to use buses more and cars less.
The council insisted that had met its obligations on consultation and that almost no-one had objected. When residents complained that the overly wide, sinuous bus lane was dangerous and forced southbound traffic into the northbound lane, the council commissioned a safety review.
The council said that this found that although there was nothing untoward with the initial design, and that there had been a safety review for that, they would make some changes. Work had been suspended pending the response to community outrange and would now be resumed with only minor changes.
These changes magically fell under the limit that would require a new consultation. Although there would be another look at parking outside the new Tesco express, and that would have a consultation.
Residents anger grew with the exceptionally busy WhatsApp group organising mass attendance at the responsible councillor’s surgery. He happens to be in charge of both environment, and transport. Apparently this is an efficient and sensible way to do things.
A group of us, who were central to the push-back rocked up uninvited at the local council office, and insisted on a meeting with the highways engineer who had signed it all off. Members of the wider group planned a blockade of planned works. The local MP gave some support.
The smoking gun in all this proved to be an internal council document which showed that the road, without the bus lane, didn’t cause delays to the bus service. When we got to see the first road safety audit (we never got to see the second one) the contractors had anticipated all the problems that came to light and the council chose to go ahead anyway.
What seems to be important here is that Transport for London has a target to build 25km of bus lanes, so it’s putting them in regardless of need just to hit the target. This scheme cost over £1m.
My parents had a shop, so I know the value of parking, it seems the highways planner do not. None of the shops were consulted ahead of the scheme. When the initial road markings went down it had a huge effect. One of the shops is a Toolstation. Without the scheme even going live, fear of the parking suspension saw the shop’s business drop to a level where they went from seven staff to four.
Worse it affected neighbouring shops. It transpires that builders would park outside Toolstation, go into the local café for breakfast, then the off licence for sandwiches for lunch, and then buy what they needed for their jobs from Toolstation and go off to their sites.
The council argued that a better bus service would be good for the shops, none of the shops agreed.
Jus as we were ramping up for a judicial review, the council caved. It’s crazy that it took us so much effort. The problem the council has now is that it has created an organised body which will be watching its actions.
https://www.barnet.gov.uk/news/barnet-council-call...
TL/DR: Council lied, saying that the bus lane was to make bus services better when it was actually to make car use worse.
The council started building a bus lane on Regents Park Road in Finchley on August 15th. This pretty much immediately led to residents rebelling, saying it was unnecessary, dangerous and the removal of parking would be a nightmare for those who lived on the street and local shops.
The council insisted that it was not an anti-car measure and was purely to improve the speed of the bus service and in doing so encourage people to use buses more and cars less.
The council insisted that had met its obligations on consultation and that almost no-one had objected. When residents complained that the overly wide, sinuous bus lane was dangerous and forced southbound traffic into the northbound lane, the council commissioned a safety review.
The council said that this found that although there was nothing untoward with the initial design, and that there had been a safety review for that, they would make some changes. Work had been suspended pending the response to community outrange and would now be resumed with only minor changes.
These changes magically fell under the limit that would require a new consultation. Although there would be another look at parking outside the new Tesco express, and that would have a consultation.
Residents anger grew with the exceptionally busy WhatsApp group organising mass attendance at the responsible councillor’s surgery. He happens to be in charge of both environment, and transport. Apparently this is an efficient and sensible way to do things.
A group of us, who were central to the push-back rocked up uninvited at the local council office, and insisted on a meeting with the highways engineer who had signed it all off. Members of the wider group planned a blockade of planned works. The local MP gave some support.
The smoking gun in all this proved to be an internal council document which showed that the road, without the bus lane, didn’t cause delays to the bus service. When we got to see the first road safety audit (we never got to see the second one) the contractors had anticipated all the problems that came to light and the council chose to go ahead anyway.
What seems to be important here is that Transport for London has a target to build 25km of bus lanes, so it’s putting them in regardless of need just to hit the target. This scheme cost over £1m.
My parents had a shop, so I know the value of parking, it seems the highways planner do not. None of the shops were consulted ahead of the scheme. When the initial road markings went down it had a huge effect. One of the shops is a Toolstation. Without the scheme even going live, fear of the parking suspension saw the shop’s business drop to a level where they went from seven staff to four.
Worse it affected neighbouring shops. It transpires that builders would park outside Toolstation, go into the local café for breakfast, then the off licence for sandwiches for lunch, and then buy what they needed for their jobs from Toolstation and go off to their sites.
The council argued that a better bus service would be good for the shops, none of the shops agreed.
Jus as we were ramping up for a judicial review, the council caved. It’s crazy that it took us so much effort. The problem the council has now is that it has created an organised body which will be watching its actions.
simonrockman said:
The problem the council has now is that it has created an organised body which will be watching its actions.
I wonder if this "organised body" could somehow get itself elected and form a sort of "council" and work for the benefit of local residents?Why do councils hate their residents so much?
Actual said:
I wonder if this "organised body" could somehow get itself elected and form a sort of "council" and work for the benefit of local residents?
Why do councils hate their residents so much?
Because they drive cars, despite being instructed not to by councils.Why do councils hate their residents so much?
You must do as you are told!
Scott
Not defending this bus lane. Sounds like a very badly planned thing.
But, re. "OmG ThEy dOn'T wANt You tO dRive!!"
Our towns, cities, populations are getting bigger. More people need to use the roads. Peds don't want to share with bikes. Bikes don't want to share with cars. Cars don't want bus stops every 100m. Buses (especially in London) are vital at moving hundreds of people at rush hour, and so aren't going to disappear.
So to give each of the road users their own lanes so that they can exist peacefully? Assume 3m per vehicle lane, 2m for bikes, 1.5m for peds (all each way) and you soon get to 13, 14, 15m without parking bays etc. How many roads have that much space between the houses? Not many. Roads can't get any bigger in the vast majority of cases, because you have houses etc right up to the back of footway. Would you be willing to give up your front garden so that more lanes could be put in to get all the cars in to a town/city in good time?
Getting over rivers, railways etc is limited - bridges are only so wide, and widening them will need houses to be bought and knocked down. Would you give up your riverside house so that a wider bridge could be built to accommodate the rise in cars?
Or, would you be willing to sit in traffic for an extra 30 minutes on your commute, accepting that there are now 5,000 cars trying to get where 3,000 cars were trying to go a few years earlier?
For reference, a single traffic lane can take approximately 1200 vehicles per hour before it starts to suffer genuine congestion - and that number reduces quickly if you have shops, school, pedestrian crossings, junctions etc. When you do the numbers and work out how many people would need to use a road between 7.30am and 8.30am, you can see how soon you would get to saturation, and how mass transit systems would become attractive to those trying to manage the traffic. If you sat in traffic every day, yet a bus regularly flew past in the bus lane, it soon becomes an attractive option. You only have to look at London Buses to see that.
So yes, object to the bus lanes - but the end result would just drag everyone down to the worst situation, equally.
But, re. "OmG ThEy dOn'T wANt You tO dRive!!"
Our towns, cities, populations are getting bigger. More people need to use the roads. Peds don't want to share with bikes. Bikes don't want to share with cars. Cars don't want bus stops every 100m. Buses (especially in London) are vital at moving hundreds of people at rush hour, and so aren't going to disappear.
So to give each of the road users their own lanes so that they can exist peacefully? Assume 3m per vehicle lane, 2m for bikes, 1.5m for peds (all each way) and you soon get to 13, 14, 15m without parking bays etc. How many roads have that much space between the houses? Not many. Roads can't get any bigger in the vast majority of cases, because you have houses etc right up to the back of footway. Would you be willing to give up your front garden so that more lanes could be put in to get all the cars in to a town/city in good time?
Getting over rivers, railways etc is limited - bridges are only so wide, and widening them will need houses to be bought and knocked down. Would you give up your riverside house so that a wider bridge could be built to accommodate the rise in cars?
Or, would you be willing to sit in traffic for an extra 30 minutes on your commute, accepting that there are now 5,000 cars trying to get where 3,000 cars were trying to go a few years earlier?
For reference, a single traffic lane can take approximately 1200 vehicles per hour before it starts to suffer genuine congestion - and that number reduces quickly if you have shops, school, pedestrian crossings, junctions etc. When you do the numbers and work out how many people would need to use a road between 7.30am and 8.30am, you can see how soon you would get to saturation, and how mass transit systems would become attractive to those trying to manage the traffic. If you sat in traffic every day, yet a bus regularly flew past in the bus lane, it soon becomes an attractive option. You only have to look at London Buses to see that.
So yes, object to the bus lanes - but the end result would just drag everyone down to the worst situation, equally.
simonrockman said:
The problem the council has now is that it has created an organised body which will be watching its actions.
This matters. This is the same as what has happened to Andy Burnham and his vaaaaaaast Manchester Clean Air Zone: the pushback and legal action he got hit with stopped the scheme dead.
And as pointed out - if he tries to do it again then the public and the lawyers representing Rethink GM will come down on him like a ton of bricks.
simonrockman said:
Barnet Council is now licking its wounds after having to cancel a bus lane.
https://www.barnet.gov.uk/news/barnet-council-call...
TL/DR: Council lied, saying that the bus lane was to make bus services better when it was actually to make car use worse.
The council started building a bus lane on Regents Park Road in Finchley on August 15th. This pretty much immediately led to residents rebelling, saying it was unnecessary, dangerous and the removal of parking would be a nightmare for those who lived on the street and local shops.
The council insisted that it was not an anti-car measure and was purely to improve the speed of the bus service and in doing so encourage people to use buses more and cars less.
The council insisted that had met its obligations on consultation and that almost no-one had objected. When residents complained that the overly wide, sinuous bus lane was dangerous and forced southbound traffic into the northbound lane, the council commissioned a safety review.
The council said that this found that although there was nothing untoward with the initial design, and that there had been a safety review for that, they would make some changes. Work had been suspended pending the response to community outrange and would now be resumed with only minor changes.
These changes magically fell under the limit that would require a new consultation. Although there would be another look at parking outside the new Tesco express, and that would have a consultation.
Residents anger grew with the exceptionally busy WhatsApp group organising mass attendance at the responsible councillor s surgery. He happens to be in charge of both environment, and transport. Apparently this is an efficient and sensible way to do things.
A group of us, who were central to the push-back rocked up uninvited at the local council office, and insisted on a meeting with the highways engineer who had signed it all off. Members of the wider group planned a blockade of planned works. The local MP gave some support.
The smoking gun in all this proved to be an internal council document which showed that the road, without the bus lane, didn t cause delays to the bus service. When we got to see the first road safety audit (we never got to see the second one) the contractors had anticipated all the problems that came to light and the council chose to go ahead anyway.
What seems to be important here is that Transport for London has a target to build 25km of bus lanes, so it s putting them in regardless of need just to hit the target. This scheme cost over £1m.
My parents had a shop, so I know the value of parking, it seems the highways planner do not. None of the shops were consulted ahead of the scheme. When the initial road markings went down it had a huge effect. One of the shops is a Toolstation. Without the scheme even going live, fear of the parking suspension saw the shop s business drop to a level where they went from seven staff to four.
Worse it affected neighbouring shops. It transpires that builders would park outside Toolstation, go into the local café for breakfast, then the off licence for sandwiches for lunch, and then buy what they needed for their jobs from Toolstation and go off to their sites.
The council argued that a better bus service would be good for the shops, none of the shops agreed.
Jus as we were ramping up for a judicial review, the council caved. It s crazy that it took us so much effort. The problem the council has now is that it has created an organised body which will be watching its actions.
Top effort, well done!https://www.barnet.gov.uk/news/barnet-council-call...
TL/DR: Council lied, saying that the bus lane was to make bus services better when it was actually to make car use worse.
The council started building a bus lane on Regents Park Road in Finchley on August 15th. This pretty much immediately led to residents rebelling, saying it was unnecessary, dangerous and the removal of parking would be a nightmare for those who lived on the street and local shops.
The council insisted that it was not an anti-car measure and was purely to improve the speed of the bus service and in doing so encourage people to use buses more and cars less.
The council insisted that had met its obligations on consultation and that almost no-one had objected. When residents complained that the overly wide, sinuous bus lane was dangerous and forced southbound traffic into the northbound lane, the council commissioned a safety review.
The council said that this found that although there was nothing untoward with the initial design, and that there had been a safety review for that, they would make some changes. Work had been suspended pending the response to community outrange and would now be resumed with only minor changes.
These changes magically fell under the limit that would require a new consultation. Although there would be another look at parking outside the new Tesco express, and that would have a consultation.
Residents anger grew with the exceptionally busy WhatsApp group organising mass attendance at the responsible councillor s surgery. He happens to be in charge of both environment, and transport. Apparently this is an efficient and sensible way to do things.
A group of us, who were central to the push-back rocked up uninvited at the local council office, and insisted on a meeting with the highways engineer who had signed it all off. Members of the wider group planned a blockade of planned works. The local MP gave some support.
The smoking gun in all this proved to be an internal council document which showed that the road, without the bus lane, didn t cause delays to the bus service. When we got to see the first road safety audit (we never got to see the second one) the contractors had anticipated all the problems that came to light and the council chose to go ahead anyway.
What seems to be important here is that Transport for London has a target to build 25km of bus lanes, so it s putting them in regardless of need just to hit the target. This scheme cost over £1m.
My parents had a shop, so I know the value of parking, it seems the highways planner do not. None of the shops were consulted ahead of the scheme. When the initial road markings went down it had a huge effect. One of the shops is a Toolstation. Without the scheme even going live, fear of the parking suspension saw the shop s business drop to a level where they went from seven staff to four.
Worse it affected neighbouring shops. It transpires that builders would park outside Toolstation, go into the local café for breakfast, then the off licence for sandwiches for lunch, and then buy what they needed for their jobs from Toolstation and go off to their sites.
The council argued that a better bus service would be good for the shops, none of the shops agreed.
Jus as we were ramping up for a judicial review, the council caved. It s crazy that it took us so much effort. The problem the council has now is that it has created an organised body which will be watching its actions.
Dog Star said:
simonrockman said:
The problem the council has now is that it has created an organised body which will be watching its actions.
This matters. This is the same as what has happened to Andy Burnham and his vaaaaaaast Manchester Clean Air Zone: the pushback and legal action he got hit with stopped the scheme dead.
And as pointed out - if he tries to do it again then the public and the lawyers representing Rethink GM will come down on him like a ton of bricks.
You’re right - Rethink GM won’t let them try it again
Top tip for politicians - never start this crap when there are local elections coming up.
Nice one OP
zarjaz1991 said:
Actual said:
I wonder if this "organised body" could somehow get itself elected and form a sort of "council" and work for the benefit of local residents?
Why do councils hate their residents so much?
Because they drive cars, despite being instructed not to by councils.Why do councils hate their residents so much?
You must do as you are told!
Scott
Huge swathes of London residents, for example, would not want car traffic prioritised over mass transit, so be careful to assume councils are ignoring residents.
In the OPs case, it’s less about transport modes and more about loss of parking amenity, which the council got wrong and have rightly u-turned.
andy43 said:
signs and cameras, most of which are still up.
Not wanting to hijack the thread - but on the subject of the signs - we are basically the last house in GM on the border with Lancashire and they had stuck up a honking great sign in front of our house. I had a right battle with the council and GM but they wouldn’t shift it. Within the last few days it’s gone, which to me is the ultimate indicator that this has been put to bed. oyster said:
It s a bit PH to just assume everyone uses cars.
Huge swathes of London residents, for example, would not want car traffic prioritised over mass transit, so be careful to assume councils are ignoring residents.
In the OPs case, it s less about transport modes and more about loss of parking amenity, which the council got wrong and have rightly u-turned.
London is its own special case arguably, but only because it's been intentionally engineered this way.Huge swathes of London residents, for example, would not want car traffic prioritised over mass transit, so be careful to assume councils are ignoring residents.
In the OPs case, it s less about transport modes and more about loss of parking amenity, which the council got wrong and have rightly u-turned.
The same attitude permeates other cities and towns, where I am in (just outside Leicester), the city is obsessively attacking car drivers, deliberately creating congestion with largely unused bus and cycle lanes everywhere...and then the same elected mayor constantly complains about everyone going to the huge out of town shopping centre, Fosse Park, that is outside the city council's control, instead of shopping in the city centre. the simple answer is that you can't shop in the city centre by car, unless you want to walk miles with your heavy shopping (which will also probably get stolen from you if something big like a TV) and pay a fortune to park. So everyone goes to Fosse Park.
There is a busy junction not far from me which has short stay parking bays outside the shops that surround it. The council plans to remove these, for no other reason than they don't want people using cars. It'll kill the businesses who are up in arms about it, but the council simply aren't interested, all they care about is getting rid of cars. They hate them. They'd blockade the roads if they could get away with it.
Councils need to start working FOR their local residents instead of waging ideological warfare on them.
Scott
zarjaz1991 said:
oyster said:
It s a bit PH to just assume everyone uses cars.
Huge swathes of London residents, for example, would not want car traffic prioritised over mass transit, so be careful to assume councils are ignoring residents.
In the OPs case, it s less about transport modes and more about loss of parking amenity, which the council got wrong and have rightly u-turned.
London is its own special case arguably, but only because it's been intentionally engineered this way.Huge swathes of London residents, for example, would not want car traffic prioritised over mass transit, so be careful to assume councils are ignoring residents.
In the OPs case, it s less about transport modes and more about loss of parking amenity, which the council got wrong and have rightly u-turned.
The same attitude permeates other cities and towns, where I am in (just outside Leicester), the city is obsessively attacking car drivers, deliberately creating congestion with largely unused bus and cycle lanes everywhere...and then the same elected mayor constantly complains about everyone going to the huge out of town shopping centre, Fosse Park, that is outside the city council's control, instead of shopping in the city centre. the simple answer is that you can't shop in the city centre by car, unless you want to walk miles with your heavy shopping (which will also probably get stolen from you if something big like a TV) and pay a fortune to park. So everyone goes to Fosse Park.
There is a busy junction not far from me which has short stay parking bays outside the shops that surround it. The council plans to remove these, for no other reason than they don't want people using cars. It'll kill the businesses who are up in arms about it, but the council simply aren't interested, all they care about is getting rid of cars. They hate them. They'd blockade the roads if they could get away with it.
Councils need to start working FOR their local residents instead of waging ideological warfare on them.
Scott
Council don't "hate" drivers. That's quite an immature attitude to take, IMO. Vehicles are needed. Taxis, loading, disabled drivers, families, visitors etc etc - no council is that naive to think that every journey can be made using public transport - but our towns and cities do not have the space to allow every journey to be made by car.
Recently there has been a lot of central government funding for active travel schemes - so, cycle paths, etc. Make something more attractive for bikes, and they will get used. How many times on PH do we hear the old trope about "dog s
t and broken glass in the cycle lane, they're badly thought out, I'd rather ride in the road"? So, get the peds away from the cycle lanes (segregate), make them more consistent, and they are more likely to be used, relieving congestion. Yes there will always be examples that aren't ideal, due to the existing topography, or high numbers of residential accesses, etc, but they are certainly getting better. See my post above for details of why we the management of traffic levels is needed.
Barnet High Street was narrowed several years ago. Recently a bus lane was added just past the police station further bottlenecking the traffic.
Further down the A1000 where Lyonsdown Road tee-junctions off it, a lot of work went in to redesign the turning and we hoped there would be some sort of mini roundabout, or traffic lights which would help a notoriously awkward and difficult junction. After weeks of roadworks chaos: a cycle lane and some nice kerb stones to embellish it. No doubt the same planners who put pedestrian crossings on roundabout exits, like on Russell Lane/Oakleigh Road.
Further down the A1000 where Lyonsdown Road tee-junctions off it, a lot of work went in to redesign the turning and we hoped there would be some sort of mini roundabout, or traffic lights which would help a notoriously awkward and difficult junction. After weeks of roadworks chaos: a cycle lane and some nice kerb stones to embellish it. No doubt the same planners who put pedestrian crossings on roundabout exits, like on Russell Lane/Oakleigh Road.
Edited by Glassman on Monday 17th November 11:10
Glassman said:
Barnet High Street was narrowed several years ago. Recently a bus lane was added just past the police station further bottlenecking the traffic.
Further down the A1000 where Longmore Avenue tee-junctions off it, a lot of work went in to redesign the turning and we hoped there would be some sort of mini roundabout, or traffic lights which would help a notoriously awkward and difficult junction. After weeks of roadworks chaos: a cycle lane and some nice kerb stones to embellish it. No doubt the same planners who put pedestrian crossings on roundabout exits, like the one on Russell Lane/Oakleigh Road.
Guidance has (for many many years) dictated where ped crossings are in relation to roundabouts (or mini roundabouts in your example). Un-signallised should be very close to the exit. Signallised a little further away. Don't put them there? Then peds will just cross there anyway, and likelihood of accidents goes right up.Further down the A1000 where Longmore Avenue tee-junctions off it, a lot of work went in to redesign the turning and we hoped there would be some sort of mini roundabout, or traffic lights which would help a notoriously awkward and difficult junction. After weeks of roadworks chaos: a cycle lane and some nice kerb stones to embellish it. No doubt the same planners who put pedestrian crossings on roundabout exits, like the one on Russell Lane/Oakleigh Road.
In your example, if someone is walking along the eastern side of Oakleigh Road, are they going to walk 25m along Russell Lane before they cross? Nope. So better to have a proper crossing point where people will use it.
Some light reading
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a7...
(Para 2.1.3 probably relevant to your example)
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