It used to be called Walk to Work day but has now become Walk to Work week. This year it runs 27 April until 1 May.
I live about 3 miles form work. I walked there and back again during the February snowy weather we had when I could’nt cycle or take bus or train. I think I’ll try walking in several times next week. Why don’t you?
For most of us who live in East Dulwich, Lordship Lane defines our community. Its importance to East Dulwich as a commercial, social and cultural centre is clear. But it also serves many other purposes too – as a bus route and a through route for traffic.
It is not surprising that everyone has a view about Lordship Lane.
Road safety is always top of the list when we ask people about how Lordship Lane could be improved – what has not always been clear is what should be done to improve the situation.
So we commissioned Living Streets to help us identify the problems on Lordship Lane. The Living Streets approach is simple but effective. They walk up and down the road with a group of local people and a clip board, identifying issues and talking about possible solutions.
This is exactly what a small gang of us did. We identified loads of things that would improve the shopping experience on Lordship Lane. But overwhelmingly, the one issue highlighted was that people shopping on Lordship Lane tend to walk up one side of the street or down the other. They rarely cross the street to reach a shop on the other side of the road and when they want to – they find it unpleasant, off-putting and down right dangerous. That’s not just bad from a road safety point of view. By degrading our shopping experience it threatens the lifeblood of our local shops and encourages particularly the elderly and families to head for the safety of Sainsbury’s or White City. Better crossing points – especially outside Somerfield – was the number one way to improve things.
So that is what we have been working on and we have now got to the point where we have designed and consulted upon new crossings on Lordship Lane – at the Goose Green roundabout and outside Somerfield.
The initial results indicate that the plans are supported by over 80% of people who responded.
There is still some way to go – not least to persuade Transport for London that providing a safe crossing point won’t interfere too much with the bus timetables. I hope that in the end the road safety arguments and the need to promote our local shops in the current climate will win the day.
On Friday the Labour government blocked a bill to end fueld poverty by 2016. Fuel poverty is wher epeople have to decice whether to eat of heat their homes. Erradicating fuel poverty involves installing lots of insulation. Installing insulation is labour intensive. Saving fuel bills reduce climate heating. People without either enough heat or food are more likely to be ill or stay ill or worse.
The bill has the support of Help the Aged, Friends ofthe Earth and many other worthy organisations.
It seems truly bizarre that a Labour government blocked such a clear anti povery measure that helps prevent people being ill, fight climate heating and creates employment very efficiently.
E.coli 0157 is an infection that can prove fatal especially for children younger than 10 or older people. Those that survive this infection will very often have serious ongoing medical conditions – impaired kidney function, kidney failure and need dialysis.
Children are particularly at risk as their immune system isn’t fully developed. They’re also much more likely to put fingers or toys in mouths, or not wash hands properly. Even family vehicles need to be kept clean if they do near manure, slurry, dung or sewage.
It appears to be much more prevalent than in the past and can be avoided by excellent hygiene.
With easter coming up, if you have plans to visit farms, the countryside, zoo or other leisure facility with animals then do use the following advice:
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/publications/2003/06/17334/22401
Equally if you’re planning to rent a holiday cottage that has private drinking water supplies then check it has no livestock within 50m as this infection has been found in springs or boreholes especially on farmland.
We were out doing our rounds as East Dulwich councillors on Saturday and Sunday. Knocking on doors and asking what is great about East Dulwich we need to keep and build on and what doesn’t work in East Dulwich and we need to fix. Frankly the best part of being a councillor seeking views.
I took a breather and sat on a bench on Dawson’s Height. After reporting the dumped rubbish and sign that is broken and needs replacing I st down and enjoyed the most marvellous views across London.
A real hidden spot. If you get the chance take 30 minutes out and enjoy the whole of London panorama spread out before you.
I wrote to our local MP Tessa Jowell about the Labour Governments appalling decision to approve a third runway at Heathrow Airport.
Air travel and to a lesser degree road building are the only areas this government predicts the increase and the associaited increase in pollutuion and then provides it. If you want to produce any other pollution in any other industry you eiher are not allowed or must pay extra e.g. Carbon Credits.
If you want to read the reply she sent me and see all the platitudes then please follow the following link – clearly a stock answer for the many thousands who have written in across:
http://www.tessajowell.net/uploads/fdecc393-b238-3644-1d5b-779f340f2499.pdf
SHAME.
I’m sure everyone is as shocked as I am that a shooting incident has taken place in the Barry Road area of East Dulwich.
I understand the Police have launched a murder investigation.
At a suitable time my fellow East Dulwich councillors Richard Thomas and Jonathan Mitchell and I will be talking to the Police understand what has happened and what the next steps are.
Today the phase two extension fo the East London Line to Clapham Junction was finally announced. This will create a route from Mile End to Calpham Junction via Canada Water, Peckham, Camberwell (Denmark Hill) to Clapham. great if you don’t want to get into central London. Unfortunately this is probably a sop to recompense for the closure of the South London Line which did link two parts of central London via Peckham and Camberwell/Denmark Hill. Getting the former and keeping latter would have seen a real transformation for South Londoners travel options. Recently trains via East Dulwich and North Dulwich to East Croydon, where users could change for a variety of services, were stopped.
So Southwark rail users find thing worse in the short term. Longer term we instead get a kind of stasis – swapping the South London Line for East London Line phase 2.
The one thing that would change the game would be extending the Bakerloo line to Denmark Hill……
The weather has been unusual this week. Not remarkable in that this type of weather happens about every ten years. Weather Scientists have stated that we’re going to have a decade of colder winters. Weather forecasters even predicted the severity of this weeks weather four days in advance.
Southwark Council had gritting lorries and teams out at the right time and spread 500 tonnes in the first 48 hours. Quite normal and sensible. Those operations could be tweaked – perhaps snow ploughs on the front of the gritters, perhaps a covered storage area for salt stocks.
But it feels as though as a capital city we didn’t cope. No buses to speak of when our part of London is so reliant on buses. Schools closing for two days. All those parents who could’nt go to work even if prepared to make a big effort as they had to stay at home to look after children. Its these little instances that make it harder for Southwark residents to get or keep work.
The GCSE results cross referenced across the country were recently released.
Southwark schools have had another remarkable year. The average GCSE A*-C including Maths and English results across Southwark have gone up by +4 points. Of the 149 education authorities across England and Wales Southwark has moved up from 125th to 110th place. Nationally the average result was +2 better. So Southwark improved at twice this rate.
What a great result for al the efforts of children, parents and teachers. Well done.