Consultation underway....

Hello all sorry for the silence, lots has been going on as you can imagine.

Firstly thanks to everyone who has been in touch. We have now been contacted by people from right around the proposed (and the existing) zones. Marten Road, Douglas Ave, Penrhyn etc many people having been totally caught out by the consultation dropping through the door and having just 3 weeks to respond or even work through the issues with neighbours and figure out what is best for them.

I'm attaching a link to another blog that a resident has started (hello!), I think it would be good if we all take a look at both, as we will no doubt come across different issues.

The DROP IN's
Have been quite a hot topic with residents reporting fury at the one on wednesday, with no councillors in attendance and apparently Tom Wright claiming that the residents of Winns Ave wanted the zone they are in, hence the problems for everyone else. Now we all know that the Winns Ave residents voted convincingly against being included and it was a unilateral decision by Mr Belam that went against the consultation results, so this is a worrying turn of events - complete misinformation. If anyone has anything to report from teh Saturday meeting it would be great to hear your thoughts.

Various residents are proposing petitions, leaflets, some posters went up on lampposts too, but they were taken down by the Council. It would be great if you would all act on these ideas - the Council has started pointing people in our direction when they ask difficult questions that they don't want to answer. I'd like to encourage you to hassle the Council for information - it is the Councils job to listen to us, we elect them and pay our taxes. We are very pleased to hear from you, but don't let the Council fob you off with "get in touch with them", get annoyed and get answers!

They didn't listen to any of our feedback about these consultations, they didn't let us see a draft for the LP zone (which gives few options and doesn't reflect the prefered results from WinnsA and Diana Rd when they were consulted in 2008). They didn't even inform us when it was going to take place (though they managed to tell other resident groups). The only way we will get any joy is to get residents to get involved and vote and use the comments boxes, to call, email and write letters to the Council and hopefully get the local press involved.

I'm trying to attach a text only copy of the leaflet we have been putting through doors (or will upload a picture of it), so that residents in other areas can see what information we are passing around. Do feel free to copy, print and distribute where you are. And please let us know if you find people who haven't had the consultation pack through - just FYI I had a complaint against the council partially upheld, and only partially because the Council kept such poor records, because not all residents (4 including me that I know of on Winns Ave alone) simply did not get the pack through their door. I have had 2 emails so far this time saying the same thing - so please do let us know.

There is lots more to be said but for now we have to get on with writing to LP and WA zone residents (on the W side of the park, if anyone is interested in sorting the E side let me know).
Best wishes all - and Lorna, thank you for getting in touch about Penrhyn Hall, a worrying story and one to add to our list. Are you are in touch with the Council and petitioning users of the hall? I would also contact the local Guardian newspaper - it is an important local news story.
Andrea

Anyone seen the consultation?

Hello and Happy New Year.
No news as such to report from the Council. We received a response from Councillor Macklin to our feedback after the meeting. It was garbled, badly spelt, took no notice of our points, quibbled over not being invited to our residents meeting (we aren't invited to their meetings about the CPZs and they are making decisions about our lives!), in short it was a rant and we didn't think it worth a response. He copied in his fellow Councillors and personally I hope he is embarassed about that communication, as it was a deeply unprofessional response to a perfectly civil email from a community group.

A member of Friends of Lloyd Park forwarded us a message that had been sent around their email group. I thought I'd copy some of this text here as it is relevant to our concerns... (hmmm it appears that I can't paste the mail - I'll post this and try and figure it out.) The gist is that visitor numbers to the park and the various facilities and clubs are down and that one of the criterion of the lottery grant is increasing visitor numbers (the only park for miles). There was concern that the park will only be usable by those who live nearby, are able to walk (or my addition are lucky enough to live on a direct bus route and are able to use it). Another point is that Friends of Lloyd Park seem to have been told dates for the consultation, which is really useful (and worth noting that the Council have not told us this information, even though they are very familiar with us). Looks like the end of consultation is te 19th Feb.
If anyone gets the document through their door, it would be great to know when the consultation starts - though I'll email and ask the direct question today.
Best wishes all:)
Andrea

Summary for new joiners

Hello All, The Council has announced a new plan re: the parking situation in the area. If you would like to see more of the whole story, please do scroll to the bottom of this page and click on older posts and work your way back to the beginning. However in summary...

We had a residents meeting last week and the outcome was that many residents wanted to write to the Council to voice their concern about the proposal and how the consultation is taking place. They asked for a list of contacts and a summary of the points we discussed.
In short the Council plan, very shortly, to conduct 3 different neighbouring consultations simultaneously.

• 
  They will ask the current Lloyd Park (LP) zone to the west of the Park if they want to change the days and hours of their current zone. This is in response to complaints from those roads about the 7 day a week, 13 hour a day restrictions imposed.
• 
  They will ask Winns Ave if they want to be removed from the current zones they are in. The section of Winns Ave that is in the LP will also be asked what hours they would prefer as above.
  The results and effects of any changes made will not be known as...
• They will simultaneously be asking a large area to the North of Winns Ave (back to Billet Road) if they want a new zone put in place.
  The consensus at the meeting was that the introduction of the LP and Winns Ave Zones caused many of the problems residents now face to the north and that changes to these zones could significantly alleviate those problems. For example if Winns Ave votes out and LP votes for 5 days a week for limited hours, this would free up an enormous number of parking spaces and potentially returning the neighbouring roads to the situation before the zone, without the cost and inconvenience of imposing a new zone.

We wrote back to the Council about the concerns about the process of the new consultation at the recent meeting and suggesting some changes to the draft we were sent. To date neither Cllr Belam not Tom Wright from his office has replied, though we did have a response from Cllr Macklin which was largely unhelpful and confused. For example, in response to our statements of concern that residents raised he asked why we kept asking questions. We weren't, we were telling them what was discussed at the meeting. It makes it difficult to send him a helpful response. Will let you know when we hear from the relevant people.

Best wishes,

Andrea

Post meeting

Hello everyone,
Great to see so many people there last night, I counted over 50 a great turn out at really late notice.

I'm putting together an email with the information and contacts people wanted, which I'll send over the weekend, so that anyone who is concerned can write to the appropriate people. It was heartening so many people asked for that information.

Thanks again, you'll be hearing from us soon and I'll post again soon too.
Best wishes,
Andrea

reminder:meeting tomorrow (Thursday)

just a quick reminder for those of you interested,the next meeting is held tomorrow (Thursday) at 07:00pm at the Lloyd Park Children's Centre.
The aim is to discuss the council's latest proposal's for arranging car parking in the area.



All welcome.



thanks John,Nick,Andrea and everyone who has helped distribute reminder leaflets around the area.

PS.

The Lloyd Park Centre, which provides lots of valuable services to the local community, kindly agreed to let me stick up a copy of an email that was written to the council (and cc'd to some of us concerned about parking in the area) to illustrate the problems caused to the centre by the current parking arrangements.

For those who are interested in the issues of parking in the Lloyd Park area; I would like to share with you some recent data that illustrates the impact of the CPZ.
Comparing data about The Lloyd Park Centre's services and activities from the last quarter (July - Sept) against the same period in 2008 found the following:
1) The centre's reach was down by 272 people and,
2) The volume of users over that period was down by 514 people.
Through both periods when this data was collected the centre provided roughly the same services and activities with the same opening hours and number of staff. We continue to receive numerous complaints about the CPZ especially for families with more than one under 5, very young babies, or those who are accessing the centre after daylight hours. I would like to acknowledge and appreciate the problems facing local residents; however the solution to the problems created by the CPZ should consider the needs of the whole community. I would be interested to hear your thoughts about this and would appreciate any comments or advice.

Re consultation news...

Hello,
Some of you may have heard the latest on the reconsultation. 3 of us had the draft delivered on a Friday night by hand with a cover letter asking for feedback by the 30th of October (that days date). On the Monday 1st Nov when the council was next back at work, we asked what the real deadline was and were told the 2nd Nov. So that's 24 hours notice of the deadline.

If the council had told us when we were going to get the documents we could have arranged a meeting for the Monday and given them considered feedback, from the community on the date requested, but they don't seem keen on giving us information as we know.

I sent back my thoughts on the process, (basically outlined below, as in an email sent on the 23rd Sept to which I have still to receive a response from Cllr Belam) and on the wording. There are 3 or 4 documents that will be used depending on where you live.

The Winns Ave questionnaire was far from satisfactory, it asked if we wanted in or out and that was about it. No option to express what days or hours we wanted if it was to remain (we could be included in the N extension if our opinions more closely matched those residents preferences, rather than being left as we are in a zone we didn't want to be in with the hours being the ones least people on the road voted for in LP and the second least popular in the WA section). If the area to the north votes in favour we, on Winns Ave, will be included whether we want it or not and as the document was written we wouldn't have a vote on what those hours would be.

My arguement has always been that we shouldn't have been included first time round as there was no problem and residents didn't want it, we were the end of the zone and so could easily have not been included. Our road is now half empty all the time (according to their own traffic survey) and I have no doubt that we were a buffer that has now been removed, exacerbating the problems outside the zone. But they won't listen, or consult on Winns Ave first and let residents see the changes in surrounding roads if we vote ourselves out. They just want to extend and extend, £££££££££££££££.

The other documents are just as confused, lots of if this road votes this you will be included too, bear in mind this might happen, that might happen, basically I found the documents and the way this has been handled very manipulative.

We even had an email, when we complained that we had no time to talk to residents, implying that it was residents fault, that we delayed the meeting with the council. Just for clarification, we met them in March, they carried out the surveys in March and April (it was only 2 days btw)and then suggested meeting with us in peak holiday weeks in August. We asked for a delay of 3 weeks so that people could attend, they have been delaying for MONTHS. Sorry to shout but honestly, they aren't fooling anyone. I have to say that my first letter (december last year) to the council about this was civil, helpful, had suggestions and and a positive tone. The disregard for common sense, logic, transparency and to be honest an assumption that we, the residents, are stupid is incredible and today I have honestly lost respect for the Council and council officers in particular.

Anyway you should also have received an email inviting you to a group meeting to discuss everything and what response people would like to make.
Phew sorry for a long and ranty one, I will try and check in more regularly and look at any comments/posts that get made.
Hope all are well
Andrea

update....

Dear all, another quick update (again sorry for my absence! comments now moderated!). Just received word that in 1 week we will be able to see the consultation document, before it goes to to print - I will try and get the gist of it up on here asap. There's little more to report other than the wheels grind very slowly.

I wrote to the counsellors outlining my objections to the way that the new consultation will be carried out (in short they won't remove winns ave from the existing zone - or even consult on that - before consulting the whole area, so yet again residents won't have the full information to make the right choice and Winns Ave will not have the option of not being in any zone (we voted against last time and they included us anyway, they could just as easily have made the zones end at the end of the ladder roads leaving WA as the buffer it always was) So the upshot is chaos caused, more residents inconvenienced and a larger zone to rake in the cash. When I commented that the council were using parking as a revenue scheme, there was silence, followed by a denial and an explanation that clearly showed that they use parking as an income generator. Everyone round the table heard it.

In addition to prompting the council for the draft and for the detailed data I mentioned, which several weeks on has not been forthcoming, all I can say is frustration and idiocy reign.

I have received a response to my stage two complaint, partially upholding some of my points - that the original consultation was carried out badly (I know of 4 households on winns ave who did not receive the document) and that counsellors haven't responded appropriately to my correspondance. I am going to take it to the local government ombudsman anyway as I don't agree with other findings. Anyone else got any news on their complaints?

There was a question in one of the comments that I'll go back and try and answer now.
Best wishes
Andrea

NEWS FROM THE COUNCIL MEETING

This is a really important post for anyone interested in what is going on and what is about to happen. We met with the council and this is what happened.

THE RESEARCH
The council finally let us know what they have done since the last meeting in March. They carried out some survey work, of occupancy of the roads in the area at different times of the day (a Tuesday and a Saturday).

They took note of vehicle licence numbers only in order to see who had stayed over night and was back that evening (residents they are assuming), who had come to park during the day ("visitors" or commuters) and not so that they could check DVLA records which is what we had been told.

I have a copy of the occupancy maps, which were colour coded by road, under 70percent occupancy, 71 to 80, 81 to 95 percent and over 95 percent. It makes for interesting reading and I'm happy to send people the occupancy numbers for their road if they would like to know. I'd scan it but it is massive, if you would like to see it I can bring it round.

A brief summary is that they surveyed on 2 days at 5am, 12:00 and 19:00 on a Tuesday and a Saturday.
Carr and Fleeming take the brunt of the problems the new extension has created with Elphinstone too suffering and roads out towards the Billet roundabout also above 95percent overnight. Whether these roads have problems related to the extension, which is pretty far from them is another question. During the day on the Tuesday they surveyed Carr and Fleeming are at least 81 to 90 percent occupied, with Fleeming hitting over 95 percent at 1900 on the Tuesday but not at weekends.

Winns Ave (in the extension, having voted against it) was under 70 percent occupied the whole time except for one small stretch in the LP zone, which went into the 71 to 80 bracket for the 5am time. There is a relevant point coming up regarding the other roads in the LP zone. (I have asked for the actual figures as, as a resident I know that often it is under 40 percent occupied and this is an important point). Either way it shows that Winns Ave is half empty during the week and at weekends.

WHAT THEY ARE PROPOSING
There were 3 main points they raised (and I'll outline my opinion in the next post as I think there is a fundemental flaw)

1. They have had complaints from residents of Diana Road at the length of the restrictions imposed, saying that weekends etc are overkill. We have had residents from Badlis Road come to us and say the same thing, even though their restrictions are longstanding. The council are proposing to re consult Diana, Badlis and Winns Terrace about the hours of their restrictions. They will be given the options of reducing the days and hours of the restrictions, but not the option to remove them. They also already intended to put pay and display metres in Winns Terrace, they seem aware of the great under utility of the road there.

2. The area to the West of Diana road between Winns Ave and Forest Road (though not including Winns Ave) will be left as it is and not reconsulted. That's Mersey and the rest of the perpendicular roads currently in the WA zone.

3. Winns Ave will be reconsulted and offered the option of removing the restrictions all together, and if they decide they do want it what hours would they like. In the previous consultation Winns Ave voted firmly against and when forced to make a choice on hours went for the least restrictive options. It is now half empty and has restrictions 6 or 7 days a week over very long hours. In addition they have had complaints from Winns residents. For all of these reasons they are being given the option to remove the restriction all together.

4. They will consult the area North of Winns Ave up to the roundabout if they want restrictions too. They do not want to include the option of weekend restrictions as evenings are the main problem and 7 day a week restrictions cause complaints and distruption for all sorts of reasons.

In addition to this it became clear that a couple of residents in Carr would vote differently depending on the outcome of the reconsultation in the current zone. And so we asked that the Winns Ave restrictions be abandoned so that residents of surrounding streets could see the level of improvement. They said this wasn't possible.

I suggested doing the Winns Ave and LP zone reconsultation first (a very small area compared to what they are proposing to consult and the only bit that is legally time dependant), making any changes so that residents could be fully informed and see the outcome before consulting for a further extension to the north. They said this wasn't possible. And so agreed that a question could be added to the consultation so that "if Winns Ave vote against" and "if Winns Ave vote in favour" could be taken into account.

Personally I think there is an enormous flaw in this now I have had a chance to think about it, if the council had let us know what we were going to be discussing in advance it could have been sorted out at the meeting I'm sure. More on that in the next post.

So that is how it currently stands and they are looking at reconsulting at the end of Oct as legally they have to make modifications to the Experimental Zone within a year of bringing it in and that is rapidly approaching.

Thoughts appreciated. (If I have missed anything / mixed anything from the meeting, do let me know!)
Best wishes
Andrea

Update

Dear all, I'm sorry for my prolonged absence and for the comments that consequently have only just been made public as they were unmoderated. All up now.

This evening some of us went to the council meeting that Lorna mentioned in the previous post. It was an interesting meeting and there is much to report. I'll be updating this again at the weekend, there is quite a lot to mention and I want to make sure I get it right! (residents of Mersey road, don't worry nothing will change for you, nobody was trying to get rid of the scheme, just make it usable, acceptable, more convenient and cost effective so that more people were happy.)
I'll post more at the weekend.
Best wishes
Andrea