| Topic: | Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Devonshire Road Speed Limit | |
| Posted by: | Francis Rowe | |
| Date/Time: | 27/07/21 16:44:00 |
| Ed, your quibbles about the provenance and the methodology of the report may have some validity and so we probably can't take it as providing a definitive answer to what the precise state of opinion is among the business community on the street. That said there is no evidence available whatsoever that a majority of shops support the changes and some pretty strong alternative sources that confirm that most would have preferred to go back to the original situation. I can only offer personally the conversations I have had with four of the business owners managers in the area three of whom wanted the scheme to be completely scrapped and one of whom wanted to keep it but said it was bound to go because of the strength of opposition on the road. You talk as if it was quite straightforward that the measures were the progressive option and have unfairly described people who aren't keen as the reactionary right. That's a comical distortion although not quite as ridiculous as claiming the changes were making an important contribution to fighting climate change as some have done. It is perhaps important to step back and try and remember what the potential benefits of the scheme were and what the social cost of implementing it have been. I've taken great pleasure on sunny days over the last few years eating and drinking out on Devonshire Road but than is something I have been doing for the last twenty. There were more options when the restrictions were in place and fewer vehicles going by but it would be wrong to say the nature of the street was totally transformed rather it attractions were enhanced. As far as residents were concerned the relatively small number of people who live on Devonshire Road will probably have been pleased with the changes but the far larger number on roads such as Duke Road, Glebe Street, Brackley Road and Swanscombe Road who have seen an appreciable increase in traffic are unhappy with the changes. The extra road mileage generated also suggests that if climate change is your overriding concern then you should support reopening. The trade off is therefore more traffic going past people's home for more eating and dining in what are generally not particularly cheap restaurants and cafes. Maybe things have changed but resisting the prioritisation of the demands of the wealthy over the rest of the population was never considered reactionary in my day. The problem with the way this has been done is that the unspoken assumption has been that it would be a price worth paying if the businesses that relied on customers who parked, needed more access for deliveries or got a significant amount of their business from Glebe Estate residents stopping on their way home were to close and Devonshire Road became primarily an eating and dining street. These business pay rates, will have signed leases, will have substantial loans in many cases so in the best of times it would not be fair to attempt to make a fundamental change to the way parking and loading operates on the road on which they operate which would seriously harm their business. To do in the current situation which has presented unprecedented challenges really shows contempt on behalf of the council. This is ancient history now and we have a compromise which by its very nature means that hardly anyone will be happy with it but it does give a chance to work towards a solution that retains some of the positives of the scheme while mitigating the harms. The alarmist claims about markets not being able to operate have proven untrue because they were always able to apply for Temporary Event Notices. Whatever its flaws Jo Biddolph's report helped us get to this point and you perhaps reflect on that. |