Forum Topic

Fire Engines Delayed by LTNs

No source is given for the figures on delays to fire engines in the report currently on the front page but I presume they come from London Fire Brigade. They don't really tell us anything we didn't already know. Emergency workers had made it clear that the barriers were causing them delay. What I found annoying was the attempt by some to minimise this problem by quoting figures based on average response times for fire engines as if a minimal change showed that the LTNs were not causing extra risk. What these figures demonstrate is that probably on around 40-50 occasions in Ealing fire engines took longer to get to an incident because of LTNs. Another reason to applaud Peter Mason's decision to scrap most of these schemes despite the punitive measures that have been taken against the borough in terms of funding as a result. As I write Sue Grey has yet to present her report but the Prime Minister may be gone by the end of the day — with him will go Andrew Gilligan and Ealing will start to get its fair share of transport funding again.

Gordon Southwell ● 1323d30 Comments

I rest my case, M'Lud ......................  🤣

Rosco White ● 1317d

They still haven’t updated their phone service for recycling and rubbish. They seem to think Acton recycling centre is still open, two months after it shut forever!

Simon Hayes ● 1317d

ALWAYS petty politics with Local Council Labour, they think they're one of The Big Boys and strut around causing mayhem with everything they do, and attempt to do, and screw up.Just RUN the fornicating Council and provide a SERVICE you PenisHeads, it's not difficult ...........

Rosco White ● 1317d

The Northfields and Walpole Labour candidates will be very worried because people haven’t forgotten this whole debacle. They are also losing support from non-LTN activities, notably the inaction over Gurnell reopening and the massive overdevelopment in the borough. Failing to provide statutory housing figures for years has left the door wide open for developers.The lack of press scrutiny is the key problem. LTNs were hidden in the 2018 manifesto and not campaigned on. Indeed, all the doorstep literature from local Labour that year was about Brexit and austerity. Nothing about library closures - Driscoll and Block even boasted about saving Northfields library after the collapse of Carillion.

Simon Hayes ● 1317d

Ha Ha, "The polls point to the Tories losing even more of their few remaining seats in Ealing in May. This has nothing to do with LTNs as is due to Johnson, the cost of living crisis and the Brexit disaster."Yeah, these are all things that Local Ealing Council Labour can fix, including Saving The NHS!  😂Thank you for confirming the intellectual capacity of the Local Labour Lobotomised Lemmings and their complete inability to differentiate between National and Local politics, and idiotically vote accordingly!  👍

Rosco White ● 1317d

Sadly as ever, Us, the electorate will end up voting for a local council based on the performance of the National Government. It matters not which one is in power but it is usually mid term when most governments are less popular.This antics of this one take the biscuit, but thats the acts of individuals and egos.For many the handling of a completely into the unknown situation has been better than most comparable nations and could have been far far far worse.There's plenty wrong but it's not just the hand of Government that has played bad hands. Externally, there are as many hindrances and twists that have hardly been helpful.locally the candidates for all parties must be clear and definite about what they are standing for, a clear manifesto. LTNs were not on the last one. Nor the  promotion of oversized developments.Questions need to be asked of candidates. It's always a mire and a clear indictment of why party politics is not good for local communities anymore.

Raymond Havelock ● 1317d

Neither by election was held in a ward where LTNs had any 8mpact. 5he simple fact is that people are either incapable or 7nwilling to differentiate between the obvious failures of national government and the continued falsehoods peddled locally.

N V Brooks ● 1317d

This seems unlikely. The by-elections we have had so far suggests there is little impact on voting intentions due to LTNs. While I don't dispute there is overwhelming opposition from people on roads affected by most LTNs the majority of voters don't have a strong view on them either way.The polls point to the Tories losing even more of their few remaining seats in Ealing in May. This has nothing to do with LTNs as is due to Johnson, the cost of living crisis and the Brexit disaster. The notion that Labour might lose power is simply ludicrous.Peter Mason made a commitment when bidding for leadership that he would hold binding consultations on the LTNs which he did despite pressure from central government. You could argue that he did this out of self-interest to win the leadership vote but you could say that about any political decision ever made.

Mark Evans ● 1317d

They didn't do anything of the sort.They simply reacted to the overwhelming push back from local residents because they feared that it would lead to a loss of power at the next local election.They are not bravely standing up to an over-bearing government edict.They are behaving in their usual self-interested way.Period.

Tony Colliver ● 1317d

But this council has shown itself to be incapable of being honest with the electorate. They say one thing, do another, then deny saying the first thing. This goes beyond just LTNs.

Simon Hayes ● 1321d

Nail on head. The reports were prepared to meet the desired objective (secure government funding). Else why would 'pre-LTN' data have been fabricated to make up for the absence of any baseline data and evidential pollution monitors removed?Whatever trust some may have had in the objectivity of the reports was very swiftly eroded when this was revealed.

N V Brooks ● 1321d

I'm not disputing that the evidence used to justify LTNs was unconvincing but Ealing found itself in the awkward situation of having used the limited available data to make a case for LTNs in a report and then changing its mind about them. It was this that seems to have attracted the wrath of Mr Gilligan. It is certainly the case if these reports were prepared with genuine independence rather than as advocacy we would all be better informed about the true situation and there would be more trust in local government.

Mark Evans ● 1321d

The original LTN document was a complete volte farce produced by a partTfL funded organisation to a brief of TfLs desires. Aided and abetted by Julian Bell and several others within Ealing Council both elected and non-elected.Just a small handful of 'the great unwashed' were invited to participate and that was by selected invitation.This was before Covid.But the author of the recommendations was a published document by Lucy Taylor, a Council Executive.  This document has vanished from the web. In fact it vanished as soon as the backlash on LTNs surfaced.Maybe someone knows where to retrieve it or downloaded a copy.But it was an ill prepared and ill thought out load of thrash that clearly was not expected to be even read.But it all goes back to not dong things openly and properly.

Raymond Havelock ● 1321d

There was no baseline data. The council admitted this quite early on to the One Ealing group. So they clearly couldn’t measure the ‘success’ in any quantifiable way.However they could measure the traffic queues on the peripheral roads that didn’t exist before and have evaporated since! Just fancy that.

Simon Hayes ● 1322d

The officers were, at best, economical with the truth. They claimed possible success based on non existent or fabricated baseline data. Any executive worth its salt would surely wonder from  where the data suddenly appeared or why pollution monitors were removed. The fact that this hapless bunch did not speaks volumes. They were unable to prove anything,

N V Brooks ● 1322d

You have it the wrong way round. What Gilligan told Ealing and other councils is that if they wanted to remove schemes they would have to prove they WEREN'T working. Ealing were in the difficult position that they officers reports into the schemes included data that suggested they might be.

Mark Evans ● 1322d

They haven’t removed the cameras in former LTN 32, almost four months after the barriers were taken away. I wonder why?The real mischief is the lies that were told, straight faced and without shame, by the supporters of these schemes. They started off as Covid measures to help with social distancing, then morphed into schemes to avoid a car-led recovery if people were avoiding public transport, before simply becoming a tool to ‘improve’ our health through active travel. That these schemes achieved none of these aims is obvious to all but the most deluded.Bell, a practised deceiver, touted it as a ‘trial’ when it was clearly intended to be permanent from day one. I bet he still doesn’t think that the majority of affected residents were against them.Mason is a classic case of political expediency. He saw his chance to oust an unpopular leader and grabbed it, despite being complicit in all the policies that emanated from this regime. He even authored the 2018 manifesto. His recent pronouncements about stopping tall buildings going up in Ealing is real flim-flam, a total reverse ferret on his many utterances in support of building ever upwards in recent years.Must be an election coming up!

Simon Hayes ● 1322d

Because the buffoons who 8mplemented the one size fits all approach had to rip them out being unable to prove any degree of 8mprovement. Nuanced schemes would have been retained as would support from Gilligan.

N V Brooks ● 1322d

Oh, I think we all know that there will be a Volte-Face soon after Ealing Council Labour is returned to office next May and there'll be an inexplicably abrupt "Change of Policy" with LTNs duly re-foisted on us.In fact, I'd say you can bet on it!The weary & put upon Residents of Ealing are not mugs and are very aware that such disreputible shenanigans are par for the course and fully expected from this lot.  😉

Rosco White ● 1322d

Then why is Andrew Gilligan so furious with Ealing and on the record that their funding is being pulled?

Mark Evans ● 1322d

Traffic mitigation is indeed central government policy. Implementing a one size fits all approach by grabbing the money to introduce pollution and congestion increasing schemes was not.

N V Brooks ● 1322d

That seems a bit unfair on the current leadership who effectively have refused to implement a Conservative government policy by scrapping the LTNs.

Mark Evans ● 1322d

Local Ealing Council Labour is run and controlled by money hungry Champagne Socialists/Champagne Communists.It's ALL about the ££££££s, and NOTHING else.Just look at BellEnd's dubious personal antics, plus numerous other Local Ealing Council Labour Councillors, nearly ALL of them are at it.Whilst genuine Socialsts are appalled by Local Ealing Council Labour's conduct, I imagine the genuine Communists are overjoyed. 😆 At least the Conservatives know how to run a Council and provide a SERVICE, they proved that beyond the shadow of a doubt under the excellent Jason Stacey.Remember ..............      TRASH YOUR COMMUNITY, YOU ARE UNIMPORTANT,              VOTE COUNCIL LABOUR!This has not been a Paid Political Announcement, I've done it for Free!!  🤣

Rosco White ● 1322d

It's the nasty undercurrent of Agism and prejudice against this less able - not necessarily disabled, but nonetheless of lesser dexterity and mobility.Its been creeping in through this Mayoral administration and most alarmingly through Labour councils, the pole opposite of where one would expect this to radiate from.Bus islands planned in Brentford and Isleworth. Ever tried standing on the one in Chiswick with a pushchair, toddler, or a person with difficulties or over exuberant school kids, or ducking HGV mirrors? Clearly the brains behind these have no understanding of the world outside a CAD design program or have no concept of life beyond 40 or physical limitations.Or is it deliberate?

Raymond Havelock ● 1322d

They are playing with people’s livelihoods.All day TFL radio propaganda headed by that megalomaniac Khan.Every other advert watch your speed.Maybe people wouldn’t have to if they could get about  freely.Red routes, bus lanes yellow box fines increasing.Red route??? Mostly A40 or major roads, who the hell would stop there by choice.All about  control & £££££££££If you want support from motorists, take them with you, not turn them against you

Peter Yale ● 1322d

"the powers that be total disregard for the opinions of the public"Yeah, Local Council Labour - fine, upstanding and excellent, caring Socialists, truly representing and "For" the people aren't they.    🤣

Rosco White ● 1322d

Totally agree with all 3 contributors to this topic, so far.The dangerous thing in my mind, the powers that be total disregard for the opinions of the public.

Peter Yale ● 1322d

The one thing they could not hide was fire engines and ambulances stuck and unable to manoeuvre.Worst affected were refuse and recycling vehicles.The route changes and time and motion increases added a huge cost to the operation.As it is it is still easy to cycle about locally where LTNs were - as it was before they were there.But the bugbears remain, bad road markings, poor surfaces and slippery surfaces and uneven pavements.Sorting these out are the real problems.With Bell on the TfL board orchestrating things in his usual way, and his acolytes within LBE happy to connive, nothing sensible will come about.

Raymond Havelock ● 1322d

It simply endorsed the anecdotal evidence provided while the LTNs were in place. Any kind of road block designed to reduce traffic will have an impact on emergency services. One silly councillor in Hounslow (where the barriers really are impassable) simply states the emergency service drivers should learn more he new routes. I wonder if he’ll be so blasé when he needs an ambulance or fire engine.But the stupidity of putting minority pressure groups in charge of policy has long been apparent. Most of these advisers, particularly Gilligan, have no qualifications to oversee transport planning, particularly in a complex urban sprawl like London. This applies to idiots like Bell and Khan as well.No doubt our resident cycling lobbyist - who happily drives a car when it suits him - will denounce the LFB stats as, perhaps, ‘self-selecting’ or ‘misleading’.

Simon Hayes ● 1323d

Pig ignorant leaders who have poor management skills relying on cyclists to creat a policy on road management. Motorist are easy targets and unfortunately we tend to accept the information from high office that might is right!!!. If we were France this would not be acceptable and politicians wouldn't get away with this.

Nicolas Ozegovic ● 1323d