2 December - CPZ. Consultation Passed-by Zone
There is still no webcast Cabinet
meeting on line so probably that will be another victim of Bexley Council’s incompetence
and what may have been said there will for ever remain a secret. Just like the
tree that falls in the woods with no one there is said not to make a sound, was
Councillor Leaf’s well rehearsed long speech effectively muted?
While
driving along Lower Road Belvedere I spotted Poplar Mount which is the scene of
Bexley Council once more trampling over residents' wishes. I found a gap in the
line of cars and stopped to take a look. It is a quiet little cul-de-sac devoid of through traffic where people lived
happily together until someone with an admitted grudge against cars asked the Council to paint some yellow lines.
In my own road we had to ask over several years and get the police and local
Councillors involved before Bexley Council was stirred into yellow line action but not in
Poplar Mount. A very few people were consulted and a single notice was strapped
to a lamp post which in a cul-de-sac fewer than half the residents would have passed by.
Before they knew it. Cabinet Member Richard Diment had thoughtlessly signed an order into law.
Once back home and thinking that their newest Councillor Jeremy Fosten
might like to make a name for himself, I asked my informant if she had tried to
get her three Councillors involved. She said she had but none of them had replied to her email.
Not one!
I think at this stage the residents will be lumbered by a cunning Council which knows exactly
how to
nobble a consultation, they did it in Abbey Road 17 years ago, but they are
not likely to go down without a fight.
The
publicly available Consultation document (PDF) lists only four objections
all summarily dismissed by Bexley Council with none in favour. Someone needs to
ask more questions designed to discover why Poplar Mount/Methuen Road was on the
Council’s hit list in the first place.
The area is also on Bexley Council’s hit list for
a full blown CPZ,
same as that proposed for my address last July but about which there is no further news.