11 July (Part 3) - Lambeth Council bowls a googly. Bexley is definitely second XI
Bexley Council is definitely missing a trick. I gave myself an extra hour to
get to The Oval on Sunday but I didn’t have to wait for the rail replacement bus
and the train at Plumstead left within a minute of my arrival and even after
walking over London Bridge from Cannon Street to kill time I still arrived in Kennington 50 minutes
before the scheduled meet up with some mates.
I sat under a tree watching the traffic on the
adjacent yellow box junction mesmerised by the nightmare being played out before me.
Even
at the discounted penalty rate - is that £65? - I would estimate that that one
junction, if zealously enforced, was raking in in excess of £5,000 an hour. Taxis, cars, motorcycles and
buses, they were all swallowed up in an unavoidable trap.
The yellow box was considerably more faded than captured by Google Earth, in
fact I didn’t even notice the one to the ‘north’ of the picture (†), maybe that’s
because the bulk of the traffic was heading ‘north to south’ and ‘east to west’
in the picture so only one of the two boxes shown was the Money Box.
What Bexley needs to do to up its income is to move its stop lines back from the
junction by 40 or 50 feet.
Stop lines should come before a 20 foot space for cyclists, a further ten feet for
a pedestrian crossing and another ten feet of no
man’s land beyond (or before) that. Traffic held fifty feet back will probably not even
notice a faded yellow box junction and probably just move off when the lights go to green.
The other side of the junction is simply too far away to be sure if there is a space or not.
But that may not be quite enough to ensure a fine. What is needed is for each road exit to the
junction to have two lanes but make sure the one opposite is narrowed (by a bus
lane) but not so quickly as to be visible from across the junction. That way a
driver may see a gap and go but the driver alongside him has the same idea.
One collects a big bill.
The 30, 40 or 50 feet lead up to the junction has another great benefit.
Motorists heading towards a green light at a modest speed may see it go red long
after they have crossed the stop line. With any luck they will be caught in the
junction and block the transverse traffic flow.
The choice then is to ignore the blasting horns and stay there, creep back into
the no man’s land or cycle reservation or do the most obvious thing of trying to
continue across the junction. But that moment’s hesitation will cost you dear.
By then traffic coming from your left and turning left will have
filled any remaining gaps and the adjacent pedestrian crossing will have gone
red and kerching! It’s another £130 Penalty Notice from Lambeth’s thieving bastards.
The junction by the Oval cricket ground really is a shining example of the
London road designer’s art. Andrew Bashford will be green with envy at the
level of skill on display.
If everyone waited for their exit to become clear, on match days at least, no
one would make any progress at all. Bexley Cabinet Member Alex Sawyer please
note, your budget deficit demands action now!
Who pays the fines that the buses were regularly risking?
† A return trip confirmed that the northern yellow box has indeed been removed since the satellite image was taken.