Richard Wilson » Granville Road

Katherine gets stuck in at Holy Trinity Church Fair

Richard — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 21:23:15 +0000

Yesterday, I met up with Katherine Reece at the Holy Trinity Church Fair outside the vicarage on the corner of Stapleton Hall Road and Granville Road. When I arrived Katherine was already get stuck in, helping out on the burger stand. The Fair was very busy and seemed like a great success.

The local Safer Neighbourhood police team were there, and Katherine and I took the opportunity to lobby them over a couple of crime related problems. For instance, I quizzed Sgt Bob Stevenson about the problem with squatters taking over empty homes in Stroud Green. As a new councillor, Katherine (pictured chatting to Bob) is meeting up with the police team very soon to get a proper briefing from them on local issues.

Neighbourhood Day 2010 in Stroud Green this Saturday

Richard — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 17:12:39 +0000

Stalls, games, displays, an ecology tour and a chance to quiz Katherine, Ed and me ahead of the Election – all form part of the third annual Neighbourhood Day which takes place in Stroud Green this Saturday (April 24) from 2-4.30pm.

The idea behind the day is for people to get out and about in their local streets, meet their neighbours, have some fun and find out what is happening locally.

Neighbourhood Day is organised by the Stroud Green Residents Association (SGRA) and covers Mountview Road, Stapleton Hall Road, Granville Road and all the roads inbetween (Quernmore Road, Albany Road, Elyne Road, Addington Road and part of Oakfield Road).

This year, the events and activities include:

Residents’ stalls and games around the area offering secondhand and new books, plants, cakes, pottery, household items, children’s clothes and toys, bric-a-brac and lots more!
Meet your local politicians (Oakfield Road) and ask their views on local and national issues
Visit the Safer Neighbourhoods Police Team (at the library) – with fingerprinting for children
A fascinating history and ecology tour of Granville Road Spinney.
Fairtrade stall at Holy Trinity Church and ‘The Story of Fairtrade Cotton’ display at St Aidan’s School
A chance to see inside Holy Trinity Church
Craft Fair in the library
Talk and Q&A by local photographer and librarian Don Holtum
‘Map your Neighbourhood’ activity with the Greenwood Elfins – the local Woodcraft Group
A ‘Dr Bike’ session to help repair bikes and offer cycling advice

Helen Riley from SGRA said: ‘This is the third year we have held the event and it promises to be the best yet. People enjoy the chance to chat to their friends and neighbours and let their children play in the local streets. Everyone is welcome to come along and see what it is on offer.’

First victory for parking campaign – review promised

Richard — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 07:03:33 +0000

Great news – a long running campaign by local residents and councillors for a review of the Finsbury Park Controlled Parking Zone (CPZ) is finally being acted on by the Council, who have at last agreed to put this in their 2010/11 work plan. The review would include a parking consultation with residents who live outside the CPZ who are badly affected by displacement parking, as well as residents inside the Zone. Last year we did a survey of residents in streets outside the Zone which got over 300 responses, and presented the results to the Council. 79% said parking had got worse and 61% said they now wanted the CPZ extended, and residents on some roads have put together petitions to demand action.

This is also great news for residents who live inside the existing CPZ who regularly complain about the rules, hours and enforcement of the parking controls. It will also help residents who are angry about the boundary of the CPZ, with anomolies like the Oakfield Road bridge being included in the CPZ when there are no residents living on it. Labour councillors have repeatedly promised reviews over the last 4 years, but these pledges have always been broken.

The battle now is to hold the Council to this promise and to make sure the consultation is promptly and properly conducted, and is fair and considers all options. As councillors our job is to make sure all views are heard, whether anti- or pro-CPZ. Obviously we remain absolutely adamant that CPZs should purely be about helping solve residents parking problems, and not about raising money for the Council. We will scrutinise any proposals to brought forward by the Council to ensure they stick to this principle.

Yesterday, along with councillor Lyn Weber from Crouch End ward, I met with the council officers in charge of parking to press for this review to go ahead as soon as possible.

Pothole madness – why wont the Council act?

Richard — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 12:38:19 +0000

Like many councillors I’ve spent the last few weeks reporting all the potholes I can spot on our local roads. Its a pretty thankless task – sometimes you think it would be easier to send in a list of all the places that don’t have potholes. So far I’ve reported them on Granville, Inderwick, Nelson, Stapleton Hall and Mount View Roads (this photo is from Mount View).

Of course, the current rash of potholes has been caused by the snow and ice, and the Lib Dems have pressed the Council to do a special survey to identify these new holes. However, the Council have refused to go out and find the holes themselves and instead say they will only fill them if they are reported by residents or councillors.

I think this neglectful policy is absolute madness, as it gaurantees some potholes are missed and not repaired. The Council has a duty to keep our streets safe and potholes are incredibly dangerous for cyclists and motorcyclists. Its not acceptable for Labour to just decide potholes are not a priority.

The long term solution is for the roads with the most potholes to be completely resurfaced. It’s such a waste of money to keep patching-up roads where the surface is completely worn out and crumbling away. I’ve called time and time for these roads to be resurfaced – but too often the Council refuse to act, even though it would mean saving money in the long run.

Council presented with results of Stroud Green parking survey

Richard — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 09:28:54 +0000

Yesterday, we presented Haringey Council will the final results of the Stroud Green Parking Survey. We got a huge response with over 300 surveys completed either on the doorstep or online.

We started the survey because so many residents in the roads outside the existing Finsbury Park and Crouch End CPZs were contacting us to complain about parking (see post on launching the survey). The key results were:

79% of residents believe that parking has got worse this year
61% of residents say they are now in favour of a CPZ , 32% are against a CPZ, and 7% stated no preference.
38% of residents say they used to be against having a CPZ but are now in favour.
58% of residents believe any CPZ should only operate for 2 hours .

These results demonstrate the urgent need for a proper Council consultation looking at the options for tackling parking problems. We’ve written to the Haringey cabinet member in charge of parking demanding that he now holds this consultation - and a full review of the existing Finsbury Park CPZ.

As well as setting out residents’ views on CPZs, our letter also sets out other suggestions residents have made to reduce parking pressures, such as:

Allowing residents who live just outside the CPZ boundary to buy permits to park inside.
Allowing free parking on stretches of road where there are no houses, such as the Oakfield Road bridge or the covered reservoir.
Providing dedicated van and truck parking (in appropriate places) for local residents who run vital ‘man and a van’ businesses.

The Council must listen to local residents on parking.

75% of Stroud Green residents think parking has got worse

Richard — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:14:17 +0000

Over the summer Ed, Laura and I launched a survey of parking issues in the roads just outside the new Crouch End Controlled Parking Zone – as we were being inundated with complaints from residents. We felt we had to do our own survey as the Council had broken their pledge to hold a consultation after the new CPZ was implemented.

We’ve now had several hundred responses from the roads bordering the Crouch End and Finsbury Park CPZs. The results so far show:

Three quarters of respondents say parking has got worse in the last 6 months
62% say they are now in favour of a CPZ – with many residents saying they have been forced to change their anti-CPZ views
The vast majority of residents would want a CPZ to be operational for only 2 hours

These figures show that local people in roads such as Mount View, Ferme Park, Stapleton Hall, Granville and Quernmore, think the parking problem is getting even worse and want the Council to take action. We are using the results to demand that the Council conduct a proper consultation with residents as soon as possible. But we are also pledging to scrutinise any Council proposals for new parking restrictions, to ensure they are focused on solving the problem – not boosting Council coffers.

We will be closing the survey very soon to present the full results to the Council, so if you haven’t yet had your say please fill it out online as soon as possible (link here). This parking mess is largely of the Council’s own making – and they need to listen to residents views on how to sort it out.

Parking survey launched – tell us your views

Richard — Thu, 28 May 2009 22:40:42 +0000

Ed, Laura and I have launched our new Stroud Green parking and travel survey after testing it in a number of the roads in the area. We’ve launched the door-to-door survey in response to the Council’s refusal to hold a consultation on parking issues – despite promising they would do so after the Crouch End CPZ was introduced.

The picture of me chatting to residents of Granville Road was taken by Ed on the first day we went out surveying together. Several residents on Granville told us how a previous parking petition they had organised had been completely ignored by the Council. But it seems people are still determined to have their voice heard and we’ve had a fantastic response to the survey on the roads we’ve done so far (though there are still many more places to do).

Once we’ve surveyed all the roads we can, we will present the results to the Council to put pressure on them to take action. However, we have also put in questions on issues such as streetcar, local buses and pedestrian issues – so it isn’t just parking problems that we want to hear about.

Please do return the survey when we come to your road!

Parking promise ‘not broken’ … just postponed

Richard — Wed, 06 May 2009 20:45:53 +0000

A few weeks ago I wrote to the Haringey Council Director in charge of parking, demanding that the Council do not renege on their promise to deal quickly with parking problems caused by the new Crouch End CPZ. As I said in my previous post the Council had emailed me to say they were dropping plans to allow roads where there was strong support amongst residents to be fast-tracked into a CPZ.

Last week I got my response. Apparently, ‘the Council has not broken any promises’ – its just that our roads aren’t a priority yet: The letter says a review of the Finsbury Park CPZ (including consultation with streets outside the CPZ such as Granville Road and Mountview Road) is on a ‘provisional list’ for 2010/11.

The Council have promised to review the Finsbury Park CPZ countless times over the last 4 years – but we never seem to rise to the top of the pile! The Council’s refusal to listen on this issue has spurred Ed, Laura and I into action – and we are now testing out our own parking survey with local residents. More on this soon…

Get along to Stroud Green Neighbourhood Day

Richard — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 22:23:05 +0000

Stroud Green Neighbourhood Day is this Saturday (24th) 2pm-4.30pm. It takes place in the area on top of the hill near the Library – Mount View Road, Granville Road, Stapleton Hall Road – and the streets in between.

I was away for the last one, so I will be attending for the first time. But I’m told its quite fun and eclectic, with residents putting out stalls on the street and at the church hall with bits and peices to buy - and there are free refreshments. A tour of Granville Road Spinney is planned at 2.45pm (a great little green space that not many people realise exists).

The neighbourhood day is organised by the Stroud Green Residents Association (SGRA) and is all about bringing local people together. So please come along and help create some community spirit in Stroud Green!

Council break promise to ‘fast-track’ parking review

Richard — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 21:15:33 +0000

You may remember from my previous post Displacement fears over new resident parking zone that the Council said it would hold consultations on extending the new Crouch End Controlled Parking Zone (CPZ) to nearby roads if there was clear demand. This pledge gave some hope to residents of roads like Mount View Road, Granville Road and Ferme Park Road, who are now finding it very difficult to park.

However, the Council have now said that they will not be funding any consultations to extend the CPZ during the 2009/10 financial year. This means that roads that now have severe parking problems cannot even have a say on whether resident-only parking is needed until April 2010 at the very earliest. And the earliest any road could get a CPZ introduced would be the very end of 2010 – about 20 months after the problem started.

This is a ridiculous way to go about dealing with residents, and making decisions that effect people’s daily lives! I am very angry that promises about ‘fast-tracking’ consultations have turned out to be meaningless – only Haringey Council think that that taking 20 months is ‘fast-tracking’! I have written to the director in charge of parking and highways at Haringey making my anger very clear, and asking him why they are ignoring the problems in these roads.

However, my view is that budget decisions aren’t written in stone and if residents make enough fuss, it could be possible to get the Council to change its mind.