Elephant & Castle Northern Roundabout - latest plans

What a bold vision! I fear it may be another "Boris Island" type PR exercise where our Mayor and his Deputy hold out unrealistic dream for the purpose of courting hope rather than achieving anything more. But dreams do sometimes come true. I'd be less cynical if they weren't working in the opposite direction at the Elephant, clogging up a junction with more congestion, a bigger ring road, more air pollution and a more dangerous pedestrian environment (a claim I feel there's enough data to support now).

Why couldn't they press on with the Elephant portion of this plan right now and get The Ring road traffic underground? They could even strike a deal with the various developers to pause their reconstruction, dig a cut-and-cover-tunnel for the cars through the acres of land conveniently demolished already from Rodney Road to Newington Butts. The developers would stand to gain substantially with an improved environment for their properties and ever user would have a better journey.

The tolled road tunnel idea is just one of four strands that the Roads task force is looking at. One of the others is demand management - see https://www.tfl.gov.uk/cdn/static/cms/documents/stp-20140409-part-1-item07-roads-task-force-update.pdf

A couple of weeks ago the UK's highest court found that the UK has broken EU laws about air quality. It is now only a matter of time before we are hit with huge fines and/or required by law to put in place firm measures to reduce particulates (from diesel vehicles) and NOx (from any combustion process, including gas boilers).

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7ea982de-b244-11e2-a388-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz31W00e8KL

Somehow the politicians have managed to keep this out of the main headlines or have spun it as Saharan dust or of some kind of minor inconvenience, though it causes thousands of premature fatalities each year.

A road tunnel with filters and scrubbers on the ventilation stacks, along with reductions in road space on the current IRR, and demand reduction of the sort that is slowly happening, could bring about air quality improvements and convince the EU not to fine us, in the same way that the Thames Tunnel 'supersewer' is showing the EU that we are sorting out the diffuse water pollution issues in the Thames and avoid a fine there.

It is faintly ridiculous though. Traffic capacity through Central London *cannot* be maintained as the population grows - build as many tunnels and flyovers as you like.

The last 50 years just show that if you make it easier to drive, people will drive more, on longer journeys and fill that roadspace. M25 anyone....

The only alternative in a dense area like central London is closing areas to cars with priority to buses and cyclists (and freight in limited numbers or at limited times). And improve the tube and trains.

At some point there must be an upper limit to vehicular capacity. I just wish the politicians had the b*lls to grasp the nettle and say it! Instead they ask for further studies and potentially spend billions of our ££ on digging roads into the ground.

Jules62 wrote:

A 1980s picture of one of the E&C subways was featured in today's Telegraph:

No wonder so many risked life and limb dodging traffic above ground rather than having to use the subways...

And here is the same view in more recent times

Now why would anyone want to get rid of those, or feel that they are not a pleasant place to be...

It's an old, not a bold vision and like Ringways before it it will never be built. Too expensive, too disruptive and likely to do nothing except increase traffic levels, increase congestion and increase pollution. Certainly, how it is supposed to cut pollution baffles me. What are they planning to do? Pipe it down the river and out to sea? Of course not. There would be a huge network of vents all along the route pumping out concentrated traffic pollution. Would you want one near your home?

I agree it will never be built in full, but portions might make sense, much as the Westway portion of The Box improves the quality at street level around Notting Hill in comparison with the surface level ring road chugging horribly at street level through Chelsea. Something like a fly under like Kingsway would improve the quality for those remaining on the surface by keeping through traffic away from the clogged roads. More roads alone of course encourages more traffic, but in conjunction with limiting initiatives like congestion charging to maximise use of public transport, cycling and walking this needn't be the case, it would just improve the flow, pollution would be down by having less stop start traffic. Vents could apparently incorporate cleaning devices. The answer to cities surely relies on a mixture of approaches to influence behaviour and adapt to changing technologies rather than the present day simplistic / zealot attitude from too many campaigners (usually cyclists) and TfL: pedestrian subways = inhumane and outmoded (TfL), go Dutch etc.

boroughbloke wrote:

It's an old, not a bold vision and like Ringways before it it will never be built. Too expensive, too disruptive and likely to do nothing except increase traffic levels, increase congestion and increase pollution. Certainly, how it is supposed to cut pollution baffles me. What are they planning to do? Pipe it down the river and out to sea? Of course not. There would be a huge network of vents all along the route pumping out concentrated traffic pollution. Would you want one near your home?

Elephant & Castle gyratory "fine" for cyclists, says Boris Johnson
Wednesday 9 November 2011


"Though I have to tell you ...sometimes I just go round Elephant & Castle because it's fine. If you keep your wits about you, Elephant & Castle is perfectly negotiable.

"I want people to feel confident. The cycle superhighways are about building confidence."

http://www.london-se1.co.uk/news/view/5646

In the past two and a half years, almost 300 people have been injured on the roads in and around the Elephant & Castle. Since Christmas 2011, four pedestrians have died including most recently five year-old Hichame Bouadimi.

Today, a cyclist was killed on the roundabout.

Today a cyclist was NOT killed on the roundabout nor anywhere near a gyratory.

A cyclist was killed at the flagship Southern Junction of three roads laid out by TfL in 2011 and often quoted as the kind of success they want to inflict on the Northern Roundabout where five roads (two of which are part of a gyratory) meet.

It's a terrible incident but one that should be understood in the context so we can learn correctly from it.

spindrift wrote:

Elephant & Castle gyratory "fine" for cyclists, says Boris Johnson
Wednesday 9 November 2011

"Though I have to tell you ...sometimes I just go round Elephant & Castle because it's fine. If you keep your wits about you, Elephant & Castle is perfectly negotiable.

"I want people to feel confident. The cycle superhighways are about building confidence."

http://www.london-se1.co.uk/news/view/5646

In the past two and a half years, almost 300 people have been injured on the roads in and around the Elephant & Castle. Since Christmas 2011, four pedestrians have died including most recently five year-old Hichame Bouadimi.

Today, a cyclist was killed on the roundabout.

Indeed, till we know more about the detail I'm loath to comment on specifics of the event, but what is self evident from the acres of paving slabs at the Southern Junction is that there was ample room to segregate, and the TFL safety Audit suggested doing so, this was ignored.