Stop Killing Cyclists
The campaign group Stop Killing Cyclists are asking Londoners to write to political leaders and candidates standing in the local elections in May to incorporate eight demands into their manifestos.
They are not all easy to implement and would need careful consideration and consultation with our fellow Ealing residents.
However, each demand is crucial to the health and safety of people living in Ealing, whether they are cyclists or not.
Ealing Council has been making positive movements in the right direction, but needs a Green voice to push the current initiatives further, and drive for new ones like a CSH quality segregated cycleway along Uxbridge Road, and the Mini Holland already specified in our original 2014 Mini Holland bid.
Therefore, the Ealing Green Party will commit to endeavouring to meet these demands, and influencing other parties to implement them, should we be elected to the council in May.
Mini Holland and protected cycleways
Demands 1 and 3 refer to the creation of a ‘Mini-Holland’ and newly protected cycleways.
Ealing Council and Ealing Cycling Campaign have already carried out a lot of analysis and planning for their Mini Holland bid in 2014 and we will update and adapt this existing plan. Uxbridge Road is a prime candidate for a properly protected cycleway. We will insist that the current patchwork of substandard cycle route is upgraded to CSH standards.
Demand 7 refers to the danger of left-hand turns. We would fully support the introduction of protected left-hand turns and T-junction bypasses at traffic lights for cyclists where they don’t currently exist and audit the ones that are currently in place. We will push for the publication of the Uxbridge Road safety audit and ensure that its recommendations are actioned quickly and effectively.
If we are successful at implementing demand 1 and 3, we believe the safe left-hand turns should be addressed at the same time. In areas where we have not yet secured protected cycle lanes, we would want protected left-hand turns and bypasses created as soon as possible in consultation with the local community to better understand where these are most needed.
As part of our commitment to safer cycling, we currently support Cycle Superhighway 9 from Brentford to Kensington Olympia via Chiswick. In consultation with Ealing residents, we would also ask TfL for our own Cycle Superhighway for Ealing along Uxbridge Road.
Speed limits and traffic-free high streets
Demand 4 asks for a 20 mile per hour speed limit throughout the borough and Demand 6 asks for a traffic-free high street with a cycleway through it.
Given much of Ealing is currently under 20mph limits we would work to ensure the 20mph limit is implemented Borough-wide. We would also work with the Police to start to enforce this limit.
Driving in London is extremely frustrating as it is so congested, and drivers often forget that everywhere they go there will be people walking and cycling. With the 20 miles per hour speed limit we would greatly reduce the risk of accidents by vehicle collisions. People in Ealing are taking to walking and cycling at an increasing rate, we hope that safer roads will encourage even more people to do so. We believe this will help decrease the number of cars on the road.
Many high streets in other areas of London and throughout the UK have become pedestrianised successfully. We would support pedestrianisation of Ealing high streets in close consultation with local residents and businesses. Since West Ealing has won the Liveable Neighbourhoods funding we will work to ensure it delivers on its initial promise and provides a safe, liveable active travel area for all ages.
Money
Demand 2 of the 8 for 2018 campaign asks that the equivalent of £20 per person per year is spent on protected cycling infrastructure in the borough from the Council’s budget. Promoting cycling is a high priority for the Ealing Green Party in the view of air pollution reduction, health benefits through exercise, and reduction of risk of traffic accidents. We would, therefore, support this demand and commit at least £20 per person per year is spent on protected cycling infrastructure.
Ealing council vehicles
Demand 5 and 8 refer to the vehicles used by the council itself.
Demand 5 asks that the council encourages its staff to go to and from council business by bicycle instead of motor vehicle, where practical. We strongly support this. With the government’s Cycle Scheme in the workplace and initiatives such as the Santander Bikes and the newly introduced Mobikes, we feel people have genuine access to bicycles and therefore have no substantial reason for getting into a car. Especially with the right infrastructure, cycling to and from meetings will be much more time effective than cars or even public transport for short distances, and following their introduction in other councils, Ebikes for longer journeys.
Demand 8 refers to blind-spot equipment in the HGVs owned by Ealing Council, their contractors and their subcontractors. Ealing Council has already installed Cycle Safety Shield System in all its large vehicles and Ealing Green Party will insist that all HGVs that work within the Borough are equipped with the system or similar.
However, we do believe that HGVs and cyclists should not be sharing the same road space in the first place, so this demand would be implemented in parallel our efforts to create segregated and protected cycle paths. We do not want a false sense of security that blind-spot equipment could potentially provide and we do not want this demand to detract from the need of protected cycle paths.
For your information, the demands of the ‘8 for 2018’ campaign are listed below:
8 for 2018
- MINI-HOLLAND
Will you draw up and submit a bid for funding from the London Mayor’s Healthy Neighbourhoods Fund, plans to create a mini-Holland and a linked genuine Quietway route with roads closed to through vehicular traffic and removed parking, in Ealing (Name locations of proposed Mini-Holland and Quietway route) in the first year of new administration?
- £20/PERSON/YEAR
Will you commit to spend the equivalent of a minimum of £20/person/year on protected cycling infrastructure in the Borough from your Borough’s own funds, to complement the funding committed by the London Mayor?
- NEW PROTECTED CYCLEWAY
Will you commit to creating and completing a fully protected new cycle-lane, connecting with the proposed expanded London’s Mayor’s Protected Cycle Network along a major road maintained by the Borough? (Name the road/route you will create this on).
- 20 MPH BOROUGH WIDE SPEED LIMIT:
Will you implement a 20mph speed limit on all Borough maintained roads?
- COUNCIL BUSINESS BY BIKE
Will you initiate a programme to ensure staff vehicular travel on council business will instead be undertaken by bike, where practical?
- TRAFFIC FREE HIGH-STREET
Will you create a new vehicular traffic-free high-street with cycle-route through it? (Name which local high-street).
- PROTECTED LEFT-HAND TURNS
Will you introduce protected left-hand turns and T-junction bypasses at traffic light controlled junctions where there are low levels of pedestrians, as standard practice on relevant borough controlled junctions?
- SAFER HGVs
Will you install blind-spot CCTV equipment in all your EALING council HGVs, sign up your council to the CLOCS HGV safety scheme, to demonstrate a timeline for all your service vehicles (e.g. HGVs) to be FORs Gold within 5 years and make any new vehicle purchases direct vision lorries (in line with above and new 5* direct vision standard) and demand the same of any contractors working for the council or sub-contractors.
