Colum Mylod wrote:
On 4 Oct 2006 07:04:01 -0700, "Earl Purple"
wrote:

Does the route then follow Barlby Road (not even a classified road) or
does it head along the B412 (St Quintin Avenue, St Marks Road and
Cambridge Gardens) up to Ladbroke Grove. Most of these are fairly
narrow residential streets.
The boundary will be formed by the railway line that crosses over
North Pole Road so Barlby Road etc will be inside and chargeable (but
the cameras are at NPole Rd and at the top of Ladbroke Grove where the
roundabout leads to Sainsbury's, allowing free access to the big
shop). Oddly the camera before that rbt seems to cover entrance but
not exit. The side streets bordering Wood Lane will be uncharged but
residents there will have access to the 90% discount.

But for how far? What about residents around Du Cane Road etc. that
might normally use that Sainsbury's. They would no longer be able to
use North Pole Road / Barlby Road but would have to divert all the way
around up Scrubs Lane, right onto Harrow Road then right again into
Ladbroke Grove. Now won't that cause more congestion rather than reduce
it?

In that neck of the woods almost all of K&C is inside except the bits
to the south of the Harrow Road towards Sainsbos. My guess is that the
few pinch points were chosen as the edge with Sainos arguing
successfully for exemption. The xM41 and Westway will not be covered,
which could be interesting if the new shopping centre gains a few new
roads into K&C territory.

The thing is that I think many people in London don't object to the
congestion charge in the centre so much because there is fairly good
public transport to the centre - after all the underground lines do all
go to the centre of London.
Also that zone has few residents, the initial CC affected few ordinary
bods. The extended one will scalp more peeps. The buses are better for
the investment they've received.

There are quite a few mainly residential areas in the current CC zone:

- Most of what is North of Clerkenwell Road. They might have made the
CC zone instead go along Kings Cross Road / Farringdon Road up to the
junction of Clerkenwell Road then along that road and Old Street
instead of Pentonville Road / City Road.

- Most of Lambeth. Thus the zone could have gone up Albert Embankment
then along Lambeth Road.

The issues are not so much with those in the zone but with those just
outside who now have to pay the full charge to access what is inside.
Perhaps the solution is to have multiple charging zones, give residents
totally free access to their own zone and any immediate neighbouring
one, thus you have to cross through 2 zone boundaries before you have
to pay.

An example of a facility across the boundary is the Brunswick Shopping
Centre around Marchmont Street, WC1. This is just inside and used to
have (don't know if it's still there) a big supermarket. Those who
lived in Somers Town would probably have used it. Now those who live in
Somers Town would probably go up to the Sainsbury's in Camden or the
Morrison's in Chalk Farm instead.

I'd like to mention the system I saw in Madrid: bodies on the ground
enforcing local access only for locals and limited deliveries - but
there's no profit in that scheme is there?

Not sure I like the idea either. Taking away people's freedom. Not
saying that people shouldn't have to pay to drive in, but it should
still be an option.

The CC is about money:
Capita fill their boots and some sloshes to Ken. It is not a user
friendly setup either: no lights to say the zone is active, no easy
way to pay automatically after the event, in fact it appears to be
designed to make money from non-payment. And an open charter for plate
cloning or plain reregistering of the car in Poland or Latvia.

For Capita it might be. For the point of view of Tfl, the money is
redistributed - Ken does not directly pocket any of it himself. (Whilst
I have some reservations about Ken on many issues, I don't think he's a
thief).

I would rather pay a reasonable amount to have a smooth journey than
pay nothing but sit for hours in traffic. After all, time is money.

My own solution, albeit probably not too practical, would be to build
some more decent by-passes and charge for using them. The toll would
not be excessive, but even 50p a day for 60,000 users, say, would raise
£30,000 a day.

Well it's fine, they can just make every road in London private flats
and have no facilities. More and more facilities are being replaced
with private flats anyway. Hardly surprising then that to access
facilities you can no longer find any in walking distance and have to
get into your car...
London is quite poor for local walkable facilities. I've lived in
places with far more on the ground locally (and much safer bike lanes
than mere blobs of paint) but London is focused on cars + shopping
areas.

It's all based on profit and who will make the highest bid. The big
property developers can easily outbid anyone else. Suburban London is a
very popular place to live.