Work starts on the Arlington Road Low Traffic Neighbourhood
Camden council want to make it easier and safer for residents to walk and cycle, for children to get to and from school safely and by healthy means of travel, for businesses to be able to flourish and for everyone to be breathing cleaner air.
The Covid-19 pandemic has also created new road safety challenges across Camden with many Camden residents spending more time closer to home. Camden is making fast-paced changes across neighbourhoods to respond to these new safety issues and calls from local communities to improve where they live.
“To help us achieve this, we are reducing the dominance of motor vehicles on our residential streets to make travelling locally easier, safer, healthier and more enjoyable. Most people in Camden do not own a car, so making it easier for them to walk safely and feel confident enough to take up cycling means we are rededicating our public space to residents’ needs.
“These changes will mean less traffic is using residential streets to cut through between main roads. This will benefit all local people and open up new possibilities, such as for children and parents to feel they can do the school run by bike.”
Since before the pandemic residents and businesses from the local communities in the streets to the west of Camden High Street have contacted the council to suggest ways that the council could help them travel more safely.
Many of these were suggested and supported by people using the council’s online engagement tool Commonplace. This was set up to give the opportunity for residents, businesses and visitors in the borough to suggest locations to respond to the challenges that COVID-19 poses to travel.
The Commonplace tool is not currently is use but you can read all the comments made on the website here: https://camdensafetravel.commonplace.is/
Residents also told us that following the initial lockdown they enjoyed the quieter streets and cleaner air, with more space to walk and cycle locally without cars.
They also said that motor vehicles, including heavy goods vehicles, use the residential streets to the west of Camden High Street between Mornington Crescent and Camden Town as a cut through to avoid using main roads, and that a significant volume of traffic is using Mornington Street and Mornington Crescent to access Camden High Street, and lots of through traffic uses streets north of Parkway.
Councillor Harrison continued:
“We are going to make the streets around the Arlington Road area, from Mornington Crescent to Camden Town, quieter, safer and healthier just as the community asked. This in turn will benefit pedestrians, children and those who cycle.
“To achieve this we will be making changes at six different locations in the local area. These measures include restricting traffic via no entry signs, planters, islands and cameras.
“These changes will significantly reduce the amount of vehicles using these residential streets to cut-through between main roads, including Heavy Goods Vehicles.
“We know that 85% of all trips made by Camden residents are made by sustainable options – public transport, walking or cycling. But residents will still be able to reach every house, on every street by car, receive home deliveries and so on - and emergency services and refuse vehicles can always access every property in the area.”
Work on the Low Traffic Neighbourhood commenced on Thursday 24 September.
For more detail on all the changes in this location, and to view detailed plans you can visit our website https://www.camden.gov.uk/making-travel-safer-in-camden or contact us via: [email protected] / 020 7974 4444.
- The council are using Experimental Traffic Orders to make these changes quickly so that it can respond to the safety challenges of Covid-19. These orders allow it to trial changes on streets as an experiment for 18 months instead of consulting in advance.
- The council would still like to carry out a full public consultation after 12 months but because it knows that Covid-19 might cause extra challenges, it will take a decision on whether and if so, how it undertakes a consultation closer to the time.
- Residents can still comment on the changes the council are making at any point. These comments, the consultation, traffic monitoring and other evidence will all then help the council to decide if the changes should be made permanent.