Press Release
15th October 2002
Parking plans will sabotage green transport agenda
Croydon Cycling Campaign have warned that plans to maximise the number of parking bays in the central Croydon parking zone will sabotage the Council's sustainable transport strategy and air quality action plan.
The proposals are to be discussed at the forthcoming meeting of the Traffic Management Cabinet Committee on Monday, 21st October 2002, as part of the Council's response to their highly controversial and bitterly contested parking plans. The report's authors claim that there are no considerations on the matters of cycling, human rights, environment and equalities.
CCC representative Austen Cooper said we're very unhappy that the Council is sorting out its short-term financial problems by creating long-term environmental health problems. Up to 189 Croydon people die each year and up to 250 have to go to hospital because of air pollution caused mainly by traffic. We think the proposals to increase parking in central Croydon will make these figures worse. We are also very concerned that the potential to make central Croydon a better and safer place to cycle will be jeopardised by filling potential cycle lanes with yet more car-parking spaces. Article 2 of the Human Rights Act requires the Council to safeguard human life, not make money out of shortening it.
The Council's Air Quality Action Plan was adopted in April 2002 and identified the central Croydon area as likely to have pollution levels exceeding the Government's Air Quality Strategy objective for nitrogen dioxide (NO2).
The Council's Sustainable Transport Strategy states, High levels of pollutants such as nitrogen dioxide (N02) and small airborne particulates (PM10) are estimated to bring forward the deaths of up to 189 people in Croydon each year. High pollution also results in around 250 hospital admissions annually in the borough. The chronic effects of prolonged exposure to higher pollution levels are more difficult to estimate, but there has been a definite increase in asthma, particularly in children, over the last ten years.
The Air Quality Action Plan quotes government guidance notes on "Developing Local Air Quality Action Plans and Strategies: The Main Considerations" (DETR 2000b) which sets out the principles of Air Quality Management Area (AQMA) action plans and local air quality strategies. It states that, amongst other things, local authorities should carefully assess options available to improve air quality in AQMAs and involve all relevant local authority professionals and departments to ensure a properly balanced and integrated approach. There is no evidence that the report's authors have consulted their colleagues in Environmental Health on such considerations.
One of the specific objectives in the Council's Air Quality Action Plan is The Council will lobby the Government and Greater London Authority to implement traffic reduction measures throughout London, in accordance with its responsibilities under the Road Traffic Reduction Act 1997. This is wholly at odds with the plans to increase on-street parking provision in an area known to have poor air quality.
This unintegrated approach to transport planning and air quality management is surprising, given that the Air Quality Working Group Membership included Traffic Management Cabinet Committee member, Councillor Maggie Mansell (Cabinet Member for Public Protection and Public Health) and Chris Martin, Divisional Director - Traffic, Parking & Civil Engineering.
The Traffic Management Cabinet committee report of 2nd July 2002, dealing with the same subject of parking in central Croydon, stated that Parking controls help to improve the safety of roads, which benefits all road users including cyclists (2nd July 2002). This does not accord with the loss of potential cycle lanes in central Croydon, and is wholly at odds with the experience of cyclists in Croydon who find cycle lanes blocked by either legal parking spaces or illegally parked cars that Council parking wardens ignore.
The meeting of 2nd September 2002 said, in general parking control strategy aims to ensure that obstructive or dangerous parking does not take place and that charges and controls are set so as to encourage parking to take place off-street wherever possible, rather than on-street. Controls are also intended to facilitate public transport movement, making it more reliable and attractive and to encourage people to use more environmentally sustainable transport modes. This is contradicted by the plan to increase on-street car-parking spaces.
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