metFeb03

NOTES ON HFCYCLISTS MEETING
Tuesday 4 February 2003, 7.30pm in the info centre

Present: Cllr Andrew Jones, John Griffiths, Louanne Tranchel, Chris Tranchel, Pat Tookey.

Apologies: Cllrs Charlie Boyle, Gavin Donovan, Stephen Burke; Jane Knight, Mark Alderton, Alex Forrest, Roger de Freitas, John Ryan, Bill Ogden, Andy Weeks, Sophie Reid, Grevil Quinn, John Gilbert, Christopher Hack.

COUNCILLORS

Andrew needed to leave after 30 minutes so we discussed how to influence the Council and get things done.

Andrew emphasised the importance of the local ward Councillor for a particular problem.
Said he had approached Mike Cartwright / Roger Khanna several times and small things had been done very quickly in his ward.

John said main problem is the great barriers to cycling. So for SBG or Hammersmith Bwy we should try to get the relevant councillors onboard. If they send memos to officers then the officers have to respond. So we should approach the Councillors for the relevant areas.

On a general approach, like commitment to cycling, we discussed which councillors might be interested. We raised the possibility of Labour councillors working together with Conservative councillors. Should be able to.

John said that at the Full Council meeting dealing with the Cycling Motion he was disappointed that the problems had not been addressed more deeply. Pat said that she had been to the last Council meeting where the closure of the swimming pool and nursery had been discussed. She was disappointed that the Labour backbenchers had remained quiet. The general view was that the Council meetings were a controlled display. However cycling seems to be getting some attention after the debate.

RESULTS OF OUR LETTER PRAISING COUNCIL'S CYCLING MOTION

After our last meeting John sent an email on behalf of the group. It went to various Labour councillors. It referred to our motion praising the Council and also asking the Council to speed up the production of the Cycling Strategy and improve consultations.

The following replied: Colin Aherne, Stephen Burke, Andrew Slaughter, Iain Coleman.

Alex Forrest has reported that the Cycling Strategy has been given the go-ahead by Jon Whitwell and the draft strategy should be going to Deputies on 6th March (subject to being ready) for approval for public consultation.

John will write to Chris concerning the Cycling strategy. In this rapidly changing climate we hope that we may have some fresh consultation / input into the strategy. And we should press for significant targets / performance indicators. Louanne said a policy has targets. Performance indicators come from scrutiny, audits. We note that consultation on the issues paper finished over 4 months ago.

MEETING WITH ROGER KHANNA

Tuesday 28 January 2003 at 6.30pm in LBHF Town Hall
Roger Khanna, Head of the Highways Division. LBHF
Chris Bainbridge, Head of Transportation Policy Team, LBHF
Cllr Charlie Boyle, Conservative, Fulham Reach ward.
John Griffiths, co-ordinator hfcyclists / London Cycling Campaign.
Matt Dunkley, chair H&F Local Agenda 21

Roger has said that he would check the notes for accuracy, but at the time of this meeting they had not been received. We used the unapproved notes at this meeting.

The notes of the meeting are summarised in the form of a script. We read this through.

Chris read ROGER
Louanne read JOHN
Andrew read CHRIS
Pat read CHARLIE
John read MATT

The meeting had been very frank and useful. It covered specific places and issues.

Roger khanna's advice included:

a) The best way forward is to look at Best Practice. If there is a problem look for somewhere were it is being done better. In London, elsewhere in the country or abroad. Then it will get done.

b) The other thing is to use Performance Indicators. The way forward is to have targets. Set them and then we have to achieve them.

c) You have to safeguard what you already have. You are in danger of losing cycling facilities to motorbikes.

d) You have an uphill struggle. Car owners have a much greater lobby than cyclists. You need to convince the Councillors, who can then press the officers to do something.

We will discus the meeting further via email when approved notes are released.

MEANWHILE

Dealing with the simpler matters raised, we will do the following.

John to send letter to RK on behalf of group thanking him for the meeting and for being so frank and helpful.

On the riverside send Rik's Ken Gardens stuff to RK.

Letter to the Metropolitan Police Commissioner re accidents. Pat shocked that the fatal incident involving a schoolgirl at the Broadway is not in the official accident statistics.

John will ask Chris Bainbridge if he can have a meeting with him and perhaps Pat and other interested members to attempt to unravel how our UDP / travel plans / mayors plans can be used to make the roadways safer.

Write to Bill Basra / Huw Davies concerning possibility of a Scrutiny panel meeting on cycling.

John said that he would like to see a debate between Roger and Jenny Jones - the GLA member keen on road safety. Jenny is meeting with Wandsworth cycling group on Tuesday 11 Feb

SHEPERDS BUSH GREEN

Pat asked what was happening at SBG. John said he thought that the Goldhawk rd and Rockley rd junctions had been planned and were about to be implemented. That these had been planned without any overall plan for cycling in the area.

In the future the southern interchange would be built incorporating the Central Line station. This would have a bus station and have buses crossing to the bus stops outside the W12 centre. The region from the roundabout to Rockley rd would be difficult for cyclists. John had suggested having the bus stops on an island next to the Green. Like a tram stop. This would allow for a more streamlined flow, and be better for cyclists and all other traffic.

Pat thought the green bits to bypass roundabout were a waste. If you used them going West you had to stop at the lights too many times and the timing was against you.

John said he had watched the area for a short while. Few cyclists used the tracks. Most use was from cyclists coming from the south and going counter-clockwise to the east or north-east.

TRAM

Chris had asked the LocalAgenda21 group to endorse the Tram. Not enough of us here to make a meaningful resolution. John will write to Chris saying yes, we approve of it in principle, but would hope that LBHF and TfL show greater consideration for cyclists than has been shown so far at SBG.

EMAIL GROUPS

LCC head office are organising an email group for those interested in the tram. Please send john g an email [john@truefeelings.com] if you want to be on it.

If you are interested in London-wide philosophical discussions, on LCC policy, conflicts with motor bikes, congestion charge, highway code, shared use / segregated cycle lanes, bad things about cyclists in the Evening Standard, etc then send an email to:

lcc-issues-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

You may be asked to supply a few details about yourself especially if you are using a throwaway email address (eg. hotmail, yahoo.com , etc.)

SURFACE LEVEL CROSSINGS

John took a photo of the Architectural project panel in the info centre showing pedestrians crossing the Talgarth rd to the Apollo. This was produced many years ago. Louanne said that the Council had said that it would be impossible to put crossings in at the north of the Broadway. When the Broadway shopping centre opened the crossings somehow became possible overnight.

OYBIKE

Louanne said she had met Garth Ellis who was working with Gordon Keenan at the Urban Partnership. The bikes would have an ad covering the back wheel. This would be let by the month, allowing local voluntary groups to be able to afford an ad. John Ryan will have a role replacing ads and looking after the bikes.

On the previous day John Griffiths had been to a borough groups meeting at the LCC head office. After the meeting John was talking to two of the organisers. It was mentioned that at the LCC AGM last year someone [possibly the inventor] had complained that the local group co-ordinator had been obstructive about OYbike. Because of all the positive publicity about such an innovative system they wondered how I could possibly be critical of any aspect of it.

As we left and got to the street John explained how the docking system worked. A little gedanken experiment. We imagined that one of the Sheffield stands had a docking station attached. One of our bikes was locked to this stand. It was a shared-use OYbike stand. Then we placed another bike [the OYbike] on top of this and attached it by an imaginary tether to the imaginary docking station. Could our bike below this be removed easily. The verdict was: IMPOSSIBLE.

Then we placed a further two bikes on top of the pile. John has sent them notes of some of our meetings showing that it was not just John who has raised concerns.

OYbike now has a website. Find out more. And there is a place where you can invite yourself to the Launch. http://www.oybike.com

NOTE FROM ALEX FORREST

Apart from the news about the date for the cycling strategy Alex has sent us this.

Local Cycle Schemes - most of the money will be spent on up-grading the route through Bishops Park, and a number of minor improvements along that route betwen Putney Bridge and Hammersmith, including signing.

New cycle stands are being installed in a number of locations, including King Street west, Fulham Palace Road/Fulham High Street, Upper/Lower Mall, Riverside Studios, and at a number of stations. Some of these additional stands are intended to offset the use of stands by Oybike bikes.

LEAFLET DISPENSERS

We had agreed a few months ago to get some leaflet dispensers for bike shops and libraries etc. However we did not get around to this. John to order some. [probably £50-£70]

EXPENSES

John had spent £10 on 2 reams of paper. Tonight's wine and juice covered in a previous purchase.

NEXT MEETINGS

Tuesdays 4 March, 1 April, 7.30pm at Info Centre

John Griffiths [co-ordinator hfcyclists]
020 7371 1290
07789 095 748
john@truefeelings.com
our website www.hfcyclists.org.uk