29 September - If at first you don’t succeed… it’s only taxpayers’ money
I have only ever submitted one question to a Full Council meeting and it was way
back in 2010 when I asked the cost of enclosing Lesnes Abbey Park in a low
scaffold pipe and wood fence the previous year. (Photo 1 alongside.) The answer came back that it was to keep
motorcyclists out of the 88 hectares of woods and it cost a little under £75,000. I
didn’t really believe it as I had just spent three grand on just one side of my own garden.
The Cabinet Member excused the project by saying it was
authorised by the Labour Administration in 2006.
14 years later my fence and the original concrete posts is still standing as good as new whilst Bexley’s
ineffective motorbike deterrent had to be increased in height using longer
wooden posts and twice as much scaffold pole. Should I ignore
the intermediate repainting of the posts?
Since then it has been progressively repaired and replaced again because the posts have rotted.
From my New Road correspondent comes the following comment and pictures…
Here
is an example of Bexley’s habit of not getting things right at first (or subsequent) attempts.
This incompetence is obviously a great waste of money. The first picture shows some of the unsuitable wooden posts.
I am sure you can think of many other examples like Welling Corner traffic lights and the ever-changing
junction at the Civic Offices in Bexleyheath.
The examples that leap immediately to mind are the roundabouts on
Wickham Lane that buses were unable to negotiate and the slightly different
situation at
the Southern End of North Cray Road which was voted to be
among the most stupid bits of road design in the country.
(†)
Ruxley Corner again.
Wickham Lane second attempt.
† The website domain name has changed and the content reduced since it was first created but
Bexley still merits a page for its too frequent road design idiocy.