It’s rare for any local councillors to be praised. However, that was the case many years ago when the previous Thames Ward councillors managed to have implemented the morning entrance restrictions at the junction of Renwick Road and Bastable Avenue. Joy spread across the land! Well, at least across Thames View. It meant that vehicles using the A13 in the morning rush hour were no longer able to ‘rat run’ along Bastable Avenue, spreading congestion and pollution across the estate in the process.
By 2010, when the View ended up with me as one of its councillors, I attended my first meeting of the local residents’ association. The association had some clear demands.
“Will you provide the station south of the A13 we were promised?” (We have Barking Riverside now, but are still working on an intermediate station between Riverside and Barking).
“Will you provide the secondary school south of the A13 we were promised?” (We now have the school at Riverside with consideration for a second should Thames Road redevelopment eventually warrant it.)
“Will you attend the meetings at Beckton Sewage Works.” (I did until the odours being produced there were better contained). Finally, “Will you stop us being fined by the junction restrictions?”
This latter point has proven to be trickiest to achieve. Council officers were concerned that, at times when vital Government grants were being cut (local council tax pays for less than a fifth of services), this request, if granted, would require additional funding for staff. They would need to compile a list of exempted vehicles (the CPZ list couldn’t be used) and then both ensure the appropriate exemptions and update the list whenever a resident changed their car or moved home.
Transport for London (TfL) and the Metropolitan Police were also not keen on the exemptions, citing concerns for traffic safety.
Eventually, at the start of this year, a scheme and a timetable were agreed. This scheme would improve traffic safety, make the junction clearer and help drivers, cyclists and pedestrians alike and exempt registered residents from being fined for re-entering their estate.
Frustratingly since then, despite constant badgering by Barking Riverside and Thames View councillors, work has been slow in coming forward. The current delays are linked to TfL anxieties about how the change will impact upon the much-delayed replacement of the Lodge Avenue, now expected next year, though why these projects cannot be dealt with entirely independently remains a mystery to many of us.
We WILL deliver these exemptions! Sometimes improvements can take longer than all of us want, but we will get there!
By Councillor Cameron Geddes
