BG&DRA: "Urgent response required to Pinkham Way consultation"

"You may have seen via the PWA that a new consultation process has started on what’s called a 'Site Allocations – Development Plan Document'. Basically there are 54 sites discussed in the document across the borough and one of them is Pinkham Way. The outcome of this consultation could make it much easier for NLWA to develop the site in an industrial manner that all residents will be unhappy about.

"Therefore your help is needed to provide a response and the quickest and easiest way to do that is to add your name to the PWA response. It only takes 2 minutes!

"You are equally allowed to provide your own response, and the PWA site gives guidance on how to do that.

"The deadline for responding is Thursday 6 March, so why not do it now while it’s fresh in your mind?"

Wed 12 Feb: "Hammersmith ‘flyunder’ options to be revealed"

"The draft findings of the council’s investigation into options to bury Hammersmith Flyover are set to be discussed at a public meeting next week.

"The ‘flyunder’ transport select committee takes place at Hammersmith Town Hall on Wednesday 12 February at 6.30pm (for a 7pm start).
 
"Transport and engineering experts have been exploring various options for a tunnel replacement for Hammersmith’s ageing and divisive flyover. The probe has been exploring various tunnel lengths and possible starting and end points, and is measuring options against social, economic and environmental benefits.

"The study will include feedback from local residents and is set to be finalised by March 2014 - when the study will be given to Transport for London (TfL) which owns and manages the A4. 89% of respondents to a council poll back some form of tunnel replacement.

"The study aims to answer two main questions which are: could a tunnel be built and should a tunnel be built?

"Cllr Nicholas Botterill, H&F Council Leader, said

“Residents’ views are vital on the question of whether we should build a tunnel and how bold we want to be. We have a range of options - from simply replacing the flyover to something far more ambitious, like a tunnel that potentially stretches from Chiswick to Earl’s Court, involving various north/south connector tunnels. All options are being explored.”

"Multinational engineering firm CH2M Hill Halcrow - one of the UK's largest infrastructure experts and builder of the Channel Tunnel - is exploring the ground conditions in the area to help answer the question of ‘could a tunnel be built’.

"Meanwhile TfL is continuing its works to repair the flyover, with some overnight and partial closures of the flyover needed along as well as local road closures and diversions.

"Come along to the council’s Transport Select Committee at Hammersmith Town Hall on Wednesday February 12, 2014 at 7pm."

The Guardian: "The Enfield Experiment: London's fortunes distilled into a single borough"

"The Guardian's senior economics commentator kicks off a new series looking at the challenges facing the London suburb where he grew up – and the ideas that might offer a radical fix"

"Link to the web site, me old cock-sparrow"

"How do you fix a broken economy? No bigger question faces post-crash Britain. Yet after six years of pledges of virtue – of borrowing less, exporting more, greater investment, factories not banks – the Westminster classes have led us back to their favourite diversion: blowing hard into a balloon marked 'house prices'.

"Meanwhile, the existential problems of how Britain pays its way in the world, and how its people earn a decent living, without depending on credit or welfare, go ignored. Indeed, the most intriguing answer I've seen lies not in the beartraps George Osborne and Ed Balls set for each other – but 10 miles north of parliament, in Enfield.

"... Eastern Enfield is also handicapped by some of the worst public transport links anywhere in north London, with no tube and only two trains from some stations into the city every hour. Graduate Antony Blacker can tell you what that's cost him: he was rejected from a post in the borough next door, Barnet, because it wasn't practical for him to commute by bus." [Light-rail, anyone?]

2014-02 Enfield DLR