Parking
CPZ Confirmation
14/10/15
Cllr David Poyser has confirmed that a meeting of Labour Councillors on 12th October agreed that, in the light of the consultation results, parking in Zone Z will remain as now, while the area around the Whittington (Zone K) will get the 24-hour restrictions as they wanted. This is to be confirmed when the Council Executive next meets. See review document.
CPZ Proposal Shelved
2/10/15
According to the Islington Gazette, overwhelming opposition to the proposed CPZ changes in the majority of the borough has caused LBI to think again. Whitehall Park would retain its current CPZ hours, as would other areas like the Angel. It is likely, however, that the area around the Whittington will change to a 24-hour CPZ as this is apparently what the majority of residents want. The final decision is officially not due until January but it looks increasingly likely that this will be brought forward. Well done to everyone who raised their voice, and to Islington for listening.
Council Response
15/9/15
Replying to an email from WHPARA asking questions about the CPZ consultation, Council Leader Richard Watts replies:
Many thanks for your email. The Leader's Question Time event at Caxton House last week was attended by over 60 people and it was a passionate discussion about the issues that are important to local people.
We originally went out to consultation because our borough has changed significantly since the last changes were made – new housing developments, more match day events at the Emirates, changes to the night time economy and our population has grown. Residents told us that the current system didn’t offer them the protection they needed.
The plan we set out offers a set of propositions in an attempt to genuinely rebalance parking on our streets so that residents are able to park in designated resident parking bays and that there is also space for family, friends to visit at any time. In my view there should never be a situation where residents and/or their family, cannot find somewhere to park near to their home.
We have received a large number of consultation responses from local people and over the next few weeks we will look carefully at what you have told us before any final decision is made. However, I also want to be clear that this is a genuine consultation. No decisions have yet been made and we will listen to what has been said in the responses.
We will be responding to the consultation in due course, with a final decision made at the Executive Meeting in January.
This was one of our biggest ever consultations – 9 weeks long. 151,200 leaflets were distributed to a large geographical area consisting of 14 CPZ areas. It was also publicised through the local media, paid for posters by the council and it was pushed out through the council’s communications department as well as the leaflets sent to each house. The overall cost of consultation was £85,000.
I completely agree with your comments about local councillors engaging with their communities on matters such as this, and I welcomed the Hillrise councillors decision to hold a public meeting on the proposals to receive feedback. I can assure you that similar events were held elsewhere in the borough, and your Islington Labour councillors will always listen to and work with local people.
With regards to Archway Gyratory, as you say these are TfL’s proposals and we are somewhat limited in what we can do to change them. The current proposals are the culmination of 20 years of campaigning to remove the gyratory from Archway. The proposals represent our best chance of achieving this goal. However, I will be working with colleagues to raise our concerns and will ensure that local people are kept informed of how this matter progresses.
We originally went out to consultation because our borough has changed significantly since the last changes were made – new housing developments, more match day events at the Emirates, changes to the night time economy and our population has grown. Residents told us that the current system didn’t offer them the protection they needed.
The plan we set out offers a set of propositions in an attempt to genuinely rebalance parking on our streets so that residents are able to park in designated resident parking bays and that there is also space for family, friends to visit at any time. In my view there should never be a situation where residents and/or their family, cannot find somewhere to park near to their home.
We have received a large number of consultation responses from local people and over the next few weeks we will look carefully at what you have told us before any final decision is made. However, I also want to be clear that this is a genuine consultation. No decisions have yet been made and we will listen to what has been said in the responses.
We will be responding to the consultation in due course, with a final decision made at the Executive Meeting in January.
This was one of our biggest ever consultations – 9 weeks long. 151,200 leaflets were distributed to a large geographical area consisting of 14 CPZ areas. It was also publicised through the local media, paid for posters by the council and it was pushed out through the council’s communications department as well as the leaflets sent to each house. The overall cost of consultation was £85,000.
I completely agree with your comments about local councillors engaging with their communities on matters such as this, and I welcomed the Hillrise councillors decision to hold a public meeting on the proposals to receive feedback. I can assure you that similar events were held elsewhere in the borough, and your Islington Labour councillors will always listen to and work with local people.
With regards to Archway Gyratory, as you say these are TfL’s proposals and we are somewhat limited in what we can do to change them. The current proposals are the culmination of 20 years of campaigning to remove the gyratory from Archway. The proposals represent our best chance of achieving this goal. However, I will be working with colleagues to raise our concerns and will ensure that local people are kept informed of how this matter progresses.
Consultation Undemocratic?
9/9/15
A member writes:
I believe that this consultation is undemocratic. Notification was piecemeal and erratic, with many local residents still not receiving notification even on the second phase of leafleting; after several emails to the Council I received mine at the beginning of August. Most local residents seem to have heard about it by word of mouth, through WHPARA or other local amenity groups and, being the holiday season by then, a lot of people were away.
More to the point, being an online-only survey it disenfranchises those without the necessary access or skills, a high proportion of whom are elderly; several of my neighbours possess neither an Internet connection nor the ability to use public facilities. Furthermore, Survey Monkey (the platform Islington uses for the survey) places a cookie on the host computer making it impossible to complete more than one survey, so a household where several people wish to give their views but have only one computer are stuck. This ‘one device, one vote’ system favours households with multiple or personal devices, with the obvious implications. If the Council wanted to create a survey where not everyone could vote, this was the way to do it.
There is also uncertainty as to the status of the door-to-door canvassing in some areas; at the CPZ meeting in Caxton House four days ahead of the deadline it was unclear what effect, if any, the information gathered would have, and whether it would be included in the survey results. Sadly there was no representative from parking in attendance to enlighten us.
I believe that this consultation is undemocratic. Notification was piecemeal and erratic, with many local residents still not receiving notification even on the second phase of leafleting; after several emails to the Council I received mine at the beginning of August. Most local residents seem to have heard about it by word of mouth, through WHPARA or other local amenity groups and, being the holiday season by then, a lot of people were away.
More to the point, being an online-only survey it disenfranchises those without the necessary access or skills, a high proportion of whom are elderly; several of my neighbours possess neither an Internet connection nor the ability to use public facilities. Furthermore, Survey Monkey (the platform Islington uses for the survey) places a cookie on the host computer making it impossible to complete more than one survey, so a household where several people wish to give their views but have only one computer are stuck. This ‘one device, one vote’ system favours households with multiple or personal devices, with the obvious implications. If the Council wanted to create a survey where not everyone could vote, this was the way to do it.
There is also uncertainty as to the status of the door-to-door canvassing in some areas; at the CPZ meeting in Caxton House four days ahead of the deadline it was unclear what effect, if any, the information gathered would have, and whether it would be included in the survey results. Sadly there was no representative from parking in attendance to enlighten us.
Consultation Closed
8/9/15
The consultation ran from Monday 6 July until Monday 7 September 2015 and has now closed. Islington are now evaluating the responses, and a final report with the findings will go to the Council’s Executive for a decision in January 2016. Following this the report and details of the final decision will be published on their website.
CPZ Meeting - 3/9/15
4/9/15
Following vocal opposition to the CPZ scheme from local residents, Hillrise Ward councillors arranged a meeting to discuss the proposals and hear residents' comments. All three of our councillors were there and there were about thirty attendees from the local area. The focus of the meeting was on the so-called Archway Regeneration Zone, but many other issues came up, including the way the consultation was being conducted, which some people thought unsatisfactory. There was also suspicion concerning the status of the door-to-door canvassing in some areas; it was unclear what effect, if any, the information gathered would have, and whether it would be included in the survey results. Unfortunately there was no representative from parking in attendance, so many of the questions went unanswered. On a show of hands the meeting was unanimously opposed to the extension of hours.
CPZ Changes - Action Required
10/8/15
You will know by now that the council is proposing to extend the hours of controlled parking across the borough; in our area (Zone Z) this is to be 8.30am-6.30pm Monday to Friday and 8.30am-1.30pm on Saturdays. There is a ‘consultation’, which runs until 7th September, and Islington sent out an A5 leaflet sometime in July to apprise us of this. But many people in our area (and across the borough) never received one; when pressed the Council said they would “look into it” and then promised to send out more leaflets. However it turned out to be only selected (or select?) streets that received them, and as of 31st July members were still emailing us to say that they hadn’t received anything. Another delivery of the leaflets finally arrived in some streets in Zone Z on 1st August.
Social sites such as Streetlife reveal this be much the same right across the borough, with many posts criticising the Council’s handling of the ‘consultation’, especially in those areas most affected by the proposals. Opposition to the scheme appears to be growing, with many people suspicious that it is simply a revenue-generating measure. This suggestion even extends to some councillors.
If you haven’t had notification yet please let us know and send a strong complaint to the Council. You can email all three councillors at once by clicking the button below. The last time there was a CPZ change in the area it was a hot local issue, so please take the time to fill in the survey as well and send any comments to your councillors.
Social sites such as Streetlife reveal this be much the same right across the borough, with many posts criticising the Council’s handling of the ‘consultation’, especially in those areas most affected by the proposals. Opposition to the scheme appears to be growing, with many people suspicious that it is simply a revenue-generating measure. This suggestion even extends to some councillors.
If you haven’t had notification yet please let us know and send a strong complaint to the Council. You can email all three councillors at once by clicking the button below. The last time there was a CPZ change in the area it was a hot local issue, so please take the time to fill in the survey as well and send any comments to your councillors.
THIS AFFECTS YOU WHETHER YOU HAVE A CAR OR NOT
In other parts of Holloway the restrictions will be extended until 9pm and 11pm, seven days a week, and in Zone K (around the Whittington Hospital) the CPZ will be in force 24 hours a day, seven days a week. These rather draconian measures will have an impact on shopping and visiting as well as a knock-on effect to adjacent zones, so if this affects you please mention it in the survey.
Diesel Surcharge on Permits
5/7/15
There is now a diesel surcharge of £96 (equivalent of £1.85 a week) added to Islington resident parking permits to “help protect residents from harmful emissions”. The surcharge applies to both street and estate parking permits for owners of diesel engine vehicles. Islington parking permits are currently already the most expensive in London - Islington Gazette.