Big red empty buses in Mill lane - Why?

Calling all those cross about the 139 bus! This is your opportunity!

This is for a) everyone who has ever complained to us about the 139 Buses using Mill Lane to and from their Cricklewood garage and b) those who ask if the buses do have to use Mill Lane why can’t they pick up and drop off passengers?

Following a site meeting earlier this year where Cllr Flick Rea met representatives of Transport for London (TfL) and Metroline who run the buses, we asked them to come and explain themselves at our next Area Action Group and they have agreed!

So now is the time to come and meet them in person and let them know what we think about their big empty buses on Mill Lane!.

The next Area Action Group will be held on Wednesday 13 November at the Synagogue Hall in Dennington Park Road NW6, just off West End Lane. The doors open at 7.00 for informal chat/networking and light refreshments and the “business” usually starts at 7.30. All welcome!

Paying at the Post office

We have just received this notification from the Council – and we believe that this in part due to the Lib Dem Councillors motion to the full Council last year, urging them to make some Council services available in local post offices. Since then the Council has seemed to be hell-bent on closing all its own local outlets so it’s a welcome move which will help local residents and help support our local Post offices! Now we wish they’d add the ability to get Visitors Parking Permits at post offices as well.

Camden Council Update: Pay for council services at your local Post Office branch
As part of our customer improvements, residents can now pay for a range of council services online at camden.gov.uk, by phone on 020 7974 6104 and in any Post Office branch. Paying by direct debit or standing order is still the simplest and most effective way to pay.

Council services can now be paid for using cash, cheque or debit card at a time and location that is convenient without having to make a dedicated trip to a council office.

With 17 local Post office branches across the borough, it means residents will never live more than a mile from a payment point and will be able to benefit from longer opening hours, including Saturdays.

Since launching in August we have seen over 60,000 transactions made through Post Offices and PayPoints.

A key aspect of our customer service improvements is that no residents are left behind and we have worked closely with our most vulnerable clients to ensure individual solutions are in place where they used the cashier’s service.

Payments for parking services are not accepted at Post Offices & PayPoints. From 31st October customers can activate their parking permit instantly without the need to visit a council building.
The cash office in the town hall, Judd Street will be closing on 31st October. Customers have a wide range of ways to make payments as highlighted above,

For more information, visit camden.gov.uk/contactcamden

What the storm did to Fortune Green

Some of us managed to sleep through the severe storm in the early hours of Monday morning, but on waking up, it seemed there was more damage than we'd thought - Fortune Green was covered with leaves and branches and a tree had been uprooted from the bed by the Sager building in front of the phone boxes blocking access to the bus stop.

Fallen branches on the Green



Tree blocking the bus stop

 




Fallen tree by the police station

 

Cllr Keith Moffitt inspecting the damage

 There was also damage to trees in the cemetery, and by Emmanuel Church and the pavement was blocked by the police station. However, after we (and probably lots of other people as well) had notified the Council, the tree teams moved in. within a few hours, the fallen tree by the police station  was cut up and removed and the blocked pavement was open again. Other damage may take longer to repair.

It's particularly sad that the Green itself suffered as on Sunday the Friends group held an open bulb-planting afternoon with the extra attraction of  a display of birds of prey and launched their new noticeboards and a rathet splendid owl totem. There was quite a good crowd of people, including families and, in the sunshine, the Green was looking its best!



Sager School refused

Camden have rejected the application for a school to move into the ground floor premises of Alfred Court on Fortune Green Road.

The full decision is available on the Camden website.

Five reasons are given for refusal (although at the time of writing this they don't appear sequentially on the website). Four of the relate to the area of greatest concern for residents who have contacted us - transport to and from the site.

More detail will follow - and as we know from the past - a refusal doesn't mean that the decision can't be appealed. But here are the reasons for refusal as taken from the website...

Reasons 1
The proposed private school, by reason of its catchment, reliance on private transport, unsatisfactory arrangements for on-site servicing and parking for the proposed use, would result in an unsustainable development, detrimental to the operation of the site and contributing to congestion in the local area and highway safety impacts on and near to the site...

Reasons 2
The proposed development, in the absence of a legal agreement requiring a management plan for the school, would be likely to result in unacceptable impact on the site and local area...

Reasons 3
The proposed development, in the absence of a Workplace and Student Travel Plan, would be likely to give rise to significantly increased car-borne trips and would result in a unsustainable form of development...

Reasons 4
The proposed development, in the absence of a legal agreement to secure a delivery and servicing management plan, would be likely to contribute unacceptably to traffic disruption, and would be detrimental to the amenities of the area generally...

Reasons 5
The proposal, in the absence of a legal agreement securing contributions towards Camden's Pedestrian, Environmental and Safety improvement initiative would fail to undertake external works outside the application site, and would fail to secure adequate provision for the safety of pedestrians, cyclists and vehicles...

Flooding at West End Green



Cars and bystanders were forced to wade through knee-high water after a flash flood hit West End Lane yesterday afternoon, putting shops and businesses at risk.

The flood, which rushed through the high street around 4pm, followed an unusually heavy downfall of rain and stretched along the north end of the street by Pizza Express and West Hampstead fire station.

Following the quick-thinking of nearby firefighters who waded through the water to clear the drains, shops at risk from the torrent of water were saved from any damage.

                        

Nick Russell wading through the water at West End Green

Nick Russell, (member of our local LibDem Spotlight team, a former councillor who lives in Mill Lane and who happened to be there at the time) said :

“It’s a good job the firefighters were there
to help clear the drains. It was shocking  
to see people having to wade through
knee-height water after such a short
period of rainfall.

I think in this case it must have been due
to drains which hadn’t been properly 
cleared of fallen leaves but we’ve had
endless problems with flooding in the area!”

Water leaks and flooding have been a long-standing problem in the area and have prompted angry residents and councillors to call for Thames Water and the council to get to the bottom of the issue.

Reports that basements and cellars of homes in Fordwych Road and the West End Lane area have been flooded have been circulating since December last year.

Cllr Keith Moffitt, who represents West Hampstead, said yesterday’s flooding comes after a series of reassurances were given to residents about sorting problems out. "Thames Water came to talk to us and made a long list of promises about flooding in the area but problems seem to be continuing. It's happened before and it will go on happening whenever we get really heavy rain as long as the Council don't clear the drains regularly and until Thames Water gets its act together and starts giving value for money. Our bills get higher every year and the service just seems to get worse!"

This report appeared in the Ham & High online on Monday 



Visitors parking permits - changes to the system

If you regularly get visitor permit scratch cards, you will know the process of getting them has changed over the years. Once upon a time we had local parking offices where you could get both residents and visitor permits, and when these were closed down you either could ring up and get them sent to you or you could visit the Town Hall and pay in person.

Soon you will no longer be able to visit and pay for them at the Town Hall - so you can only get them by phone or online but now the Council is moving to a new system altogether which they think will be more "flexible" and quicker.

This is from a recent parking document by the Council:

"Camden is in the process of moving away from the traditional approach of displaying a physical permit towards a system based on the vehicle registration being held on a database of active valid permits. This system is referred as ‘e-permits’ and is currently being introduced across Camden. The programme began in April 2012 and is expected to be completed by December 2014.
The eventual aim is to phase out all existing card permits as well as visitor permit scratch cards, so permit customers no longer need to display anything inside the vehicle).

E-visitor parking permits (eVPs) are already available in all CPZs across the borough. This means that rather than purchasing scratch cards, residents can now use their visitor parking permit allocation more flexibly by purchasing and activating their visitor parking sessions using the following channels: mobile app at the following link, via a permit customer account, SMS or by ringing Contact Camden. Once a customer has “migrated” to using e-VPs, they will no longer be able to purchase the old scratch card permits."
This is easier and qicker for some but not all "customers" - we recently had an email from a very aggrieved resident who said: " As a resident in Camden for over 36 years I have seen many changes in our borough, some good, some not so good. But the idea of closing the only site for buying visitors parking permits, Judd Street, at the end of October. thereby forcing people to phone in and buy by debit card, assuming you have one: or going on line for an 'e' ticket assuming you have access to a computer : or getting an app for your phone assuming you have a phone or your phone can take an app. My and many of my friends phones do not have that facility....

You have no proof if you use the internet or App system. You are reliant on information being accurate on the computer or you will be ticketed.

What happens when the computers are down ?
How do you convince a traffic warden that you have a valid permit to park there?

You have got to not only to buy time online but then have to phone/.email./text or however you make contact, and give the registration number of the vehicle and if it runs over the time initially allocated you have to be available to contact Camden, which will actually be a call centre (and how long will that take) to use more time rom what you have bought as an "e' ticket.

You will have no visual reminder of what time is left on the 'e' ticket.

What about the elderly with no internet access, or those with no phone, or whose phones cannot take the App, or who are out of credit, or in a poor reception are --- What are they to do?

If you use the phone they are only going to be there during office hours -- so what happens to people like my sister whose restriction go on until 10pm and on Saturdays?

Not only will you have to buy time with an 'e' ticket but you have to activate them on the computer as well. Not everyone is at home all day or has access to a computer all the time.

Sites do crash: what then?

When does Camden plan to publicise and explain /consult with residents? this is very shabby treatment indeed. This not a user friendly scheme!"

Says it all really!!

Proposed Kinsgate School expansion - is it too late for a rethink?

Camden have come up with a proposal to help solve the problem of the shortage of primary school places locally which involves providing a new school on an area called Liddell Road. Many people in Fortune Green will not have heard of it as it is an industrial estate just off Maygrove/Iverson Roads backing onto the railway line and the Sidings Peace Park. It has been considered as a potential site for a future new school for some time (back when the Council was run by the LibDem/Conservatives) but since then the landscape has changed.

Under the present Government, the only new schools that can be built are Free Schools or Academies. Unfortunately, the current Labour Administration in Camden are ideologically opposed to these options, even though academies were introduced by the last Labour Government and the new Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt has stated that the bulk of existing free schools would be kept open as his party wanted to "keep the good free schools". ) Instead of creating a new primary school for the area, Camden’s current administration are therefore promoting the expansion of an existing school (Kingsgate) funded by building homes for sale on the site and throwing off all the existing businesses.

Everyone agrees that the need for additional school places in the area is a high priority, but we believe that this approach is flawed. Kingsgate is rated as an “Outstanding” school, and its success and educational provision to local children should not be compromised by political expediency.

Our response to the Council includes the following key points:
1) There is no good educational case to be made to have a school based on two sites, a mile apart with railway lines in between, with no clear access route between the two. Further, it could have a harmful effect on the community feeling of the existing Kingsgate School.
2) The increase of 412 additional pupils on the new site will add to traffic and pedestrian congestion on West End Lane and Kilburn High Road especially during peak morning rush hours with families travelling to, between and from the two sites. It is not likely to be acceptable or attractive to families.
3) If an application had been made to build a Free School or Academy, the funding would come from Central Government and so there would be no need for Camden Council to raise money through selling off the land to developers to build expensive homes for sale (120-160 units) and, in the process, putting 250 people who work in the existing businesses out of work. 

While this complicated and flawed scheme has been progressed by the current administration with painful slowness, two new primary schools (Free Schools) in Camden have been through the whole process and opened with central government funding. This new school "extension" would not be open until at lest 2016.

Rubbish - our streets are a mess! Time for a clean-up!

Rubbish - its all round us and seems to be getting worse!

Every day, there seems to be a new pile of litter by a lamp post or a tree or just by someone's garden wall. And that doesn't take into account the piles of stuff round the local recycling centres - the horror on Minster Road seems to be a semi-permanent feature of our landscape and from time to time the West End Green and Fortune Green road "Mini-centres" are not much better. What is it about this time of year that makes people throw out furniture?  

A sort of Spring cleaning in the autumn or lots of people taking up
new DIY courses?

Also, since the changes to refuse/recycling came in in the July, our

councillors complaints bag has been full to bursting - rather like uncollected rubbish! People say they have only had half their bins emptied, or the food refuse bin has been left to fester for another week or that the rubbish is strewn all over the road during and after the weekly collection. And that's before complaints about commercial waste outside shops and dog dirt! Then you ask us why the Council doesn't seem to care about our dirty streets?

There are probably no easy answers - maybe the refuse people don't care or they're trying to do too much in too short a time, maybe they aren't properly supervised either by their own bosses or by officers in Camden who are supposed to monitor the contract. Also it seems lots of people just don't care where they leave their rubbish - smelly old mattresses, broken chairs etc. Whatever the reasons - our streets are definitely a mess!

                                     

Also, it's not very easy to make a complaint via Camden's system, but there's possible good news in sight. The Council has agreed to look at a simple way of reporting problems based on "Love Clean London" (an easy to use website) which means you just send in a photo (that's if you have the technology - if not you'll have to stick with the Camden call centre with all its difficulties!)

The other good news is that Camden's Street Environment Services have been re-organised, recruited new staff and hope that when they are all in place, things will improve and our streets will get to look a bit cleaner.

Meanwhile - over in Fordwych Road - some enthusiasts have planted flowers instead of rubbish round their trees!  Thank you!

Campaign for a clean-up! Make our street environment better and our area somewhere pleasant to live!

Christmas events on West End Green

It's going to be lively on West End Green in the run up to Christmas!

Saturday 30th November the annual West Hampstead Christmas Market, 10am-4pm
supported by the West Hampstead Business Association.

Stalls will include local artists, crafts, festive food, jewelry and cards.
Activities will include African drumming, carol singing, arts and crafts and dancing for families and children.
Local shops involved include Kitchen Table, Achillea Flowers, Village Haberdashery and others as well as the Mill Lane Garden centre who will be selling Xmas trees!

A week later there is a new event: 6, 7, 8th December Cabbages & Frocks Festive Marketplace - to 4pm each day Stalls will include festive fayre, & vintage arts and crafts

Parking - possible changes on the way - slowly!

At long last Camden are almost ready to begin the full house-to house consultation on parking in our area –the full CAP Zone of Fortune Green and West Hampstead. But it is only the beginning of a quite lengthy process.

Camden’s officers have just held a preliminary meeting for local organisations and residents’ associations, including local Councillors. This meeting was to explain the process and timetable and discuss the questions which should be asked in the questionnaire. These will be straightforward and, for example, include (for all three CA-P subzones)what should the start and end times be on weekdays, should there be Saturday/Sunday controls and, if so, what start and end time?

Each household will have a questionnaire posted out and you should receive it on Monday 18th November. It will also be available online should you prefer, but you can’t do both!

Usually 3/4 weeks are allowed for completion and then the questionnaires will be collated and the responses assessed, and officers will make recommendations. These recommendations will be presented in a published report to the Cabinet Member responsible (Cllr Phil Jones) probably for a “Single Member Decision”. The report will make recommendations for changes in hours or subzones or for no change depending on the responses received. This is likely to be in late January and any changes agreed would then be the subject of statutory Traffic Management Order consultations which makes for another delay. Then they have to make new signs!

So, all in all, there will be no actual changes until late Spring at the earliest – but it’s not possible to alter the timetable and remember the only thing which will influence the Council is the response YOU make to the official consultation next month.

So look out for it coming through your letterbox, and be sure to respond and make your views known to Camden! Whether you own a car or not, your views are important as changes to parking affect us all – visitors as well as drivers.

If you have any queries, don’t hesitate to contact us or go direct to Camden – the officer responsible is Charlie Parish - email: Charlie.parish@camden.gov.uk or call 020 7974 4639.