Merton Borough News 2003
MCC busies itself with a great variety of interests these days, including:
We always welcome new people at meetings, our next one is on Tuesday 10 December at 8pm in Merton Park. Come and join us for a glass of mulled wine, which we hope will inspire us to new challenges and greater things in 2003!
Join us also on the West London borough groups' Winter Solstice ride to the Bulls Head at Barnes on Sunday 15 December. Meet for a 10.30 start on Wimbledon Station forecourt. Happy Xmas!
"Cyclist trainers are wanted for occasional part-time work throughout the year at schools around the borough. You do not need to be a cyclist…" We were amazed to see this Merton Council job advert in the Wimbledon Guardian recently. And the pay rate on offer (£6 per hour) reflects that they are not looking for people with any skills at all, let alone skills relevant to urban cycling.
We have written to the Road Safety Officer at Merton responsible for this recklessly casual approach to cycle training to say that we think it should be a job for professionals. The essential qualities needed to be able to teach safe cycling to children must surely include an ability to both to teach and an ability to cycle safely in modern urban conditions? We are supported in this view both by RoSPA guidelines (June 2000) and TRL Report 214 (Transport Research Laboratory, 1996)
Cycling safely on today's busy roads demands a high level of skill, just as does driving a car. We have not heard of any jobs going for non-car drivers to teach driving, or non-pilots to teach flying for that matter! We will strive to end this bad practice, hopefully before a child is killed as a result.
Bureaucracy first: it's AGM time again, all MCC members are invited. It will be at 7.30pm on Wednesday May 14th 2003, at South Wimbledon Community Centre, 72 Haydons Road, SW19. Click here for agenda. If you want to stand for election to any of the committee posts, or put a motion, please look at the constitution. We hope to see you there, and we'll no doubt finish in good time to get to Merton's best pub just round the corner, a real hidden treasure!
Success at a recent meeting of the Wimbledon Area Forum: the council leader accepted our recommendation that future meetings will report on all recent road crashes in Merton resulting in death or serious injury, action taken to improve traffic law enforcement, and progress towards the road safety targets that Merton has signed up to. Road safety is the key to getting more people on bikes in Merton. That is the message which has come back loud and clear from the 900 responses we received to our recent survey [full report click here] which has revealed widespread support for lower speed limits in Merton: even 70% of the non-cyclists that we surveyed were supportive of 20mph limits in residential streets, shopping streets and outside schools. We must improve the safety - and the perception of safety - of cycling on Merton roads, if we are ever to make local progress towards national targets of tripling cycling levels by 2010.
We hope our report will provide useful background information to those in Merton who are responsible for delivering on the above targets: all local councillors and key officers have been sent a copy. Free copies are also available to LCC members in any borough, please just send an A4 sized stamped addressed envelope, 54p postage, to MCC survey, 29 Somerset Avenue, London, SW20 0BJ.
Progress in Richmond Park at last! Is our ten-year slog to rid this beautiful medieval deer park of the scourge of motor-traffic finally beginning to pay dividends? Over 90% of the cars blasting through are not even stopping – this park has become a by-pass for excess traffic, actively encouraged by surrounding councils as it relieves their own local roads, and scandalously ignored by the Royal Parks Agency… until now.
The campaign has been a long one and is not over yet – details here. In a nutshell we want all through motor-traffic banned. Cars should be allowed in as far as the nearest car park (there are car parks near all the gates). Only then will our campaign end. We have been staunch supporters of the Friends of Richmond Park on this issue, indeed two MCC members were elected to the FoRP committee to help push things from there.
The Royal Parks Agency has finally decided to act, and will:
We welcome these steps very much as first steps towards a complete ban on cars and motorbikes in the park.
We receive ever increasing levels of complaints about cars parked in cycle lanes - a problem identified in our recent survey. We duly forward the complaints to the council and frequently raise the issue with councillors and officers. One complainant, not happy with the response he has had from the council, is taking his case to the ombudsman - we await the outcome with eager anticipation. After all, as he says, what is the point of spending all that public money on new cycle lanes just so they can be used as a free car park?
One of my ward councillors uses a bike to get about locally and assures me that she is on the case, which is just as well as the cycle lane in Raynes Park's West Barnes Lane is chokka every day, mostly it seems with minicabs and scaffolding lorries whose drivers are visiting the local greasy spoon. Double yellow lines are ignored with gay abandon, and never enforced. The cycle lane here has become totally unusable: we are forced to take our chances in the middle of the significantly narrowed carriageway as impatient drivers try to squeeze past us.
Come and help us get it sorted! MCC Meetings are at 8pm on the second Tuesday of every month except August.
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