• I ATTENDED one of the council’s Barnsbury-Laycock Liveable Neighbourhood “design workshops” last week.

We were told that the current LN, liveable neighbourhood, proposals are based on feedback received in the consultation many of us engaged with back in April, when we were asked to pin our comments to a map.

However none of this feedback has been shared in a transparent, factual, measurable, way.

Now we are being asked to complete another survey by October 22.

First, this date must be extended to give people time to understand the proposals. Talking to neighbours and passers-by, so many people remain unaware of the proposed changes to their living environment.

Secondly, Barnsbury-Laycock residents must be allowed to see the next survey results in a transparent, factual, measurable, way and not massaged to support the council’s view.

Islington Council must be made accountable.

A simpler exercise might be a poll that asks the question “Do you support the current plans for the Barnsbury-Laycock liveable neighbourhood?” respond Yes / Don’t Know / No.

At the consultation I did not speak to one person who was in favour of the current proposals.

They were all Islington residents who find Barnsbury-Laycock a great place to live and work in and do not want it to be blighted by undemocratic changes to roads and environment.

Others who managed to attend the meetings have reported the same response. No one they spoke to supported the proposed changes.

We all had ideas of how to make the area nicer and safer for residents, families and businesses, which would make better use of the £11million+ the council has allocated to this LTN.

We recognise and support the need to reduce polluting, dangerous, traffic on our roads, but as a resident of Liverpool Road – a historic residential road with more than 2,600 living alongside pubs, small businesses and a large school – I feel that our right to living in a cleaner, greener, healthier and safer environment is being largely ignored by the council planning team.

It cannot be right that those in the side streets benefit while we, their friends and neighbours, have to endure increased volumes of traffic and all the negatives that brings.

There is some suggestion in the “blurb” that traffic levels on “boundary roads” eventually decreases by 3 per cent. This is a fudged figure, as anyone who has walked, cycled, or bused down Essex Road recently will attest to.

LOUISE HOWITT, N1