Boris deserts East London

And turns his back on environmental forms of transport....

Well, that was inevitable, wasn't it?

Relieved as I am, as a Crystal Palace resident, not to have the East London Line Extension scrapped it seems that Boris have slashed swathes of budget off key transport infrastructure projects including, as listed on the BBC website:

£1.3bn cross-river tram plan which would have connected Peckham to Camden

£500m Thames Gateway Bridge scheme in east London

£750m extension of the Docklands Light Railway to Dagenham Dock in east London

£500m Oxford Street tram scheme

£170m Croydon Tramlink extension

Public space proposals for a number of areas including Parliament Square and the Victoria Embankment

Given that trams are amongst the greenest forms of transport that just shows that when you vote blue you certainly don't get green!!

And what are we getting instead?

Mucking around with bloody routemaster. If there was ever a waste of time and money and a dog whistle to those who think life was always better in the past then I don't know what is. Boris Watch has more on that point here.

I really feel for East London; Barking & Dagenham is in need of so much regeneration but it's just not going to happen without the proper transport infrastructure. And as for the Thames Gateway bridge - do you htink he's have dared to do that in West London?

Dave Hill has more details on the transport for London business plan here.

Whither the bendy bus

Ok, Bendy Buses: Dave Hill has got me excited on this in his Comment is Free piece this afternoon and I, and as on all things Londonian, have a very strong opinion on them.

So, here goes:

Firstly, if you looked at all the things that needed money spent on them in London today can we all really say, hand on heart, that buses, not having more of them but just changing the style of them, is the tip top priority for the whole of London?

More important than housing, reducing crime, dragging the tube into the 21st century, ensuring that the rail companies take the oyster card, the Olympics (well, maybe they're more important than the Olympics), congestion, climate change, the Thames barrier, keeping young people occupied on something else than stabbing each other, the threat of bombs, the City, making the west end more pedestrian friendly etc, etc, etc?????

I would say this week, like 16 other weeks already this year, many Londoners will be wondering what we can do about the high rate of teenage knife crime. Will replacing bendy buses with a modern version of the routemaster help? No, not really. Having conductors could help in an indirect way, I suppose. But, you don't have to have a routemaster to have conductors and frankly, it might be better to put the money to funding the British Transport Police; just a thought.....

I find it offensive the Boris Johnson is wasting our money on something as frivolous as this. If he was going to start up some new bus routes and put the routemasters there, then that at least would have the redeeming feature of improving public transport in London. But this, this is just frivolous!

Secondly: OK so, I too liked the open platform. It was great fun and very good for shopping on Oxford Street because the bus never went to fast that you couldn't just step on at any point down the road. But that's about it. They were too small and poky, too hot in summer, a nightmare to get off if you had any sort of shopping or luggage. And do I need to mention the fact that wheelchair users and mothers with buggies couldn't use them?

Boris Johnson told us that he was going to represent all Londoners but replacing accessible buses with routemasters is the opposite of inclusive.

I remember not long after the routemaster was phased out watching a young mother with two kids, one of whom was severely disabled. She waited at the bus stop, got on the bus, sat down putting her son in the wheelchair in the space allocated to them and then after a 5 or 10 minute ride she got off the bus and carried on wherever she was going. That journey would have been impossible with the routemaster; her new found freedom (and let's face it the efficiency because she doesn't have to use taxi's so much now) was breathtaking!

Routemasters were only fun for some people and moving away from the inclusive city that we have become should be resisted.

Thirdly, for many, many years before they were finally taken out of service the routemaster like the bendy bus that followed it only really served central London and a few arterial routes. The majority of Londoners and London bus journeys don't even use them, particularly in the suburbs. So once again, a whole lot of fuss over the centre of London and the suburbs are marginalised. Which is pretty damn surprising as it was the suburbs wot won it for him....when, oh, when will we have a Mayor that is interested in all Londoners?

The mort time we spend discussing whither the bendy bus the less time Boris has to spend on the real problems that Londoners are dealing with every day not a made up problem like the demise of the routemaster

Oyster Cards and Southern Rail Cynicism

One of my biggest transport bug bears over the last few years has been the inability to use Oyster Card on over ground rail in South East London (you know, the bit where there’s no tube). This means that unless you have a weekly or monthly travel card season ticket you cannot use your Oyster Card to pay for your travel from say, Sydenham to London Bridge. This is a pain in the neck for people like me (as we have to remember to buy our travelcard at London Bridge tube) but devastatingly expensive for infrequent train travellers who don’t but season tickets (you know those less likely to be in the receipt of a nice City of London salary). They have to either pay an extra £2 or £3 for the journey or go out of their way to go and get a daily paper travelcard in addition to any money they may have on their Oyster Pay as You Go. To say Ken and TFL have been dragging their heels on making the over ground rail companies to sign up to oyster card is to be kind!

So finally, we are getting Oyster Card at Sydenham and with it Oyster Card barriers. I’m really pleased about the Oyster Card and frankly I can’t complain too much about the barriers, or so I thought.

But…but, go on there had to be a catch, didn’t there? Well, this is it:

For some time now the gate on Platform One at Sydenham train station has been open allowing those travelling to London to go direct to the platform without having to make a detour into station approach, walk halfway down Platform Two, up over the bridge, down again and onto Platform One. My guess had been when they had opened it that they had to comply with DDA legislation. Without this gate open there is no way for those who rely on wheelchairs to get around, to get onto the platform – so they just can’t go to London!!! Never mind the bind for those with pushchairs and luggage. It was a very simple, cost effective solution! Great common sense!!

But now, because of the barriers they are going to lock the gate again!! Can you believe it? Because of course, it would need a second barrier wouldn’t it? And no, it looks like we don’t deserve access and Oyster Cards! The Sydenham Society has proposed an alternative, the provision of a reader so that Sydenham residents can “touch in”. Southern Rail doesn’t think we can be trusted.

So there. So, I’ll just ignore the fact that this morning when I got to London Bridge that they had all the barriers open so people could walk through because there’s too many people trying to get off the platform and out of the station; like they do almost every morning. Because they’re not making much money out of us already for a pretty damn shoddy service, are they?

I’ve signed the Sydenham Society petition already; please join me!

Last year they were threatening to reduce the number of services into London Bridge when the East London Line came in because we could all go to Shoreditch instead (!!!??!) and the Sydenham Society ran a big campaign and got them to change their minds, so they do know what they’re doing and if we campaign hard enough we can get something done about this. The Sydenham Society: they’re grrrrreeeeaaaaat!!!