| Topic: | Re:Re:Re:Closing Weltje Road/Rivercourt Road access | Forum Home |
| Posted by: | Francis Rowe | |
| Date/Time: | 24/03/23 08:40:00 |
| Tom, you have to concede that making more children than necessary cross a busy road is not a desirable outcome. While you are right that this presents only a theoretical extra risk against the ongoing actual casualty toll on cyclists, the first step should be to implement improved junction treatments at Weltje Road and Rivercourt Road as an emergency measure. You have earlier expressed confidence that this would reduce cyclist injuries and, if it does, there is no need for a radical change such as access restrictions at Weltje and Rivercourt. The extra risk this change would present to schoolchildren is just one of the many negative impacts of this move. In my view it would actually deliver zero benefit in safety terms at best. As I take it, your argument is that it would transfer the point at which vehicles cross the cycleway to get to the A4 from non-signalised junctions in H&F to signalised ones in Chiswick i.e. Chiswick Lane and Dukes Avenue. This sounds reasonable in theory but it really only takes about 5 minutes observation at both sites to see where the flaw is in the plan and some other posters have already pointed this out. I don't have a particular problem generally with cyclists ignoring red lights if pedestrians aren't near but they do this at their own risk and a significant proportion ignore the red phases for cyclists at both junctions. It seems therefore folly to expect that forcing traffic to cross the cycleway in in Chiswick rather than Hammersmith will reduce injuries to cyclists. It is not an experiment we need to make anyway as changes at the Hammersmith junction could potentially solve the problem. |