‘It appears that the new LTNs are built on sand’

• ABOUT 100 low traffic neighbourhoods, LTNs, were created across London last year, with more to follow.

As published by the mayor and Transport for London in locked-down spring 2020, the justification was a fear that, on lockdown easing, millions of daily journeys across the capital would switch away from public transport; and that if only a fraction switched to travel by car, London could grind to a halt, air quality worsen, and road danger increase.

To head this off and facilitate a major switch instead to walking (an expected five-fold increase) and cycling (an expected 10-fold increase), TfL announced that it would rapidly transform and repurpose London’s streets.

Cue councils across London sprinting to install LTNs.

In January this year both the impending transport calamity and the expectation of a huge boom in walking and cycling were dismissed by a High Court judge (looking at the City of London) as “mere conjecture, which was not a rational basis upon which to transform London’s roads”.

Observing that the measures taken far exceeded what was necessary to meet the “temporary challenges of the pandemic”, the judge stressed that pavements could be widened for socially distanced walking, and more road space allocated for increased cycling, without transforming “parts of central London into predominantly car-free zones”.

While the decision is being appealed, it is unsurprising that the LTN road lock-up has been widely criticised as wrongly linked to the pandemic; slipped in through the back door rather than under proper democratic process.

There has been little sign of a sustained massive upsurge in active travel, despite these accommodating road changes.

As for people avoiding public transport, when the transformational road changes were announced no Covid-19 vaccine was available.

Fast-forward a year and a comprehensive vaccination programme is rolling out across London, slowly providing a passport back to public transport.

It does therefore appear that the new LTNs are built on sand, an unreliable foundation for a lasting transformation of the streets of the capital.

As it happens, the boundary main roads around Highbury are indeed now grinding to a halt.

So has there been a lockdown-easing surge after all in car travel, to higher than pre-pandemic levels, or are our boundary roads instead grinding to a halt due to LTN traffic displacement?

If the answer to this question is the former (which looks very unlikely based on Office for National Statistics transport data) then the LTNs are not working.

And if the answer is instead the latter, then equally the LTNs are not working.

RACHEL BOLT
Within the Highbury West LTN