An open letter to the Leader of the Council
Open letter to Kieron Williams, Leader, Southwark Borough Council, and Board Member, Transport for London
Dear Mr Williams,
In Southwark Labour’s manifesto, it states (on page 17) that Labour “will work with TfL to reduce traffic on main roads and make bus journeys quicker and more reliable.”
As your Head of Highways Dale Foden may have told you, the LTNs in Dulwich that Cllr. Catherine Rose has imposed on residents against their wishes have had the reverse effect. There have been increases in traffic on all the main boundary roads and on Dulwich Village, the main road through Dulwich, causing significant delays to bus journeys.
TfL recently announced a reduced Number 3 bus service as a direct consequence of the delays being experienced on Croxted Road (A2199), a Dulwich LTN boundary road. The “root cause” of the congestion causing these delays, a recent TfL report advised, is the Dulwich LTN. We are seeing similar congestion and delays to buses (185, 176, 40) on Lordship Lane (A2216), to buses 37 and 42 on East Dulwich Grove (A2214), and to the P4 on the South Circular (A205). These are all Dulwich LTN boundary roads.
A TfL monitor on the Dulwich LTN stretch of the A205 shows traffic increased by more than 15% in 2021 compared with 2019. The promised traffic “evaporation” has not only not happened, the LTN has made traffic, congestion, pollution, cycling and walking to school on these roads substantially worse.
Please can you explain to us how, as Labour leader of Southwark Council, you are able to square your manifesto commitments with the impact of your traffic schemes? And now that you are a Board Member of TfL, how are you squaring Labour’s and TfL’s need to make bus journeys quicker and more reliable with Southwark Highways’ road closures that are slowing them down?
Your role with TfL cannot have been made any easier by the recent news that Dulwich Village Ward councillors tried to suppress the TfL report showing that the Dulwich LTN was the “root cause” of the Croxted Road delays and that, at a meeting held between representatives of Southwark Council and TfL on 21 July 2022, “two of the TfL team were subject to a lot of abuse and were left upset and in tears”, according to Walking and Cycling Commissioner Will Norman.
Now Southwark Highways are proposing, again without any prior consultation, to close the western arm (Turney Road) of the Dulwich Village junction, as well as the eastern arm (Calton Avenue and Court Lane). If this is allowed to proceed, it will have the effect of displacing even more traffic on to Croxted Road and also Half Moon Lane (A2214), causing yet more congestion and more delays to the Number 3 and Number 37 bus routes.
It is clear to even the most neutral observer that the Dulwich LTNs have failed to produce the outcomes the Council set out to deliver and continue to divide the community (for example, more of the Dulwich Village Ward electorate voted for candidates standing on “scrap the LTNs” manifestos than for Labour candidates in the May elections). The longer these measures, which two-thirds of Dulwich residents voted to scrap last year, are allowed to continue, the more your tasks as Southwark Labour Party Leader and TfL Board Member will become impossible to deliver.
Please will you advise us, so we can tell our 2,100+ supporters, how you will deliver your manifesto commitments, reconcile your two seemingly contradictory appointments, and discipline those members of your team who bullied TfL staff? Are you prepared, even at this late stage, to evaluate the wider network implications of the Dulwich LTNs in order to understand the problems they have caused?
Thank you.
Kind regards,
One Dulwich