Hmm not all disabled/elderly/pram users have access to cars by a long margin.
They may not be big spenders but will be reliable/loyal as long as they are accommodated to some extent.
They have been ignored at best.
Once you encourage people to take their car or get on a bus, they are not going to get off just up the road, but will continue to a shopping centre where the flooring is level and you can cross from shop to shop without waiting 10mins or taking your life in your hands.
Plenty of room for a wheelchair/pram, there are countless lifts/escalators for changing levels in a centre.
Widening the pavements is a positive step and if they can fix the main junction as we all have suggested for decades, fix the underpass to make it accessible, etc, then there might be hope for DR after all.
It's not all about the cars and 'popping in' to shops to grab bits and pieces, it's about making the area pleasant to hang out in. To those not too precious about the odd fella hanging about with a beer or two, the outside space at the Sylvan Post is one of the nicest things to come out of Forest Hill over the past few years: wide paving area, outside seating, good beers and food, being actually able to enjoy the summer in FH... There should be more of this, not less. And the mature trees are part of this pleasure.
It's a pity the ground floor of Heron House can't be altered to commercial use, as that would be another nice outside area for people to linger, eat, drink with deep pavements and trees, not scuttle in and out in their cars
I do actually agree that the 'park' area outside the pools could be thinned to accommodate extra parking there as there's plenty of room and no ammenity is being lost nor the social sphere curtailed.
I wouldn't want to see the Sylvan Post's outside seating area suffer for this either - and I agree with your suggestion about the Heron House frontage. I honestly believe that the existing trees, together with the telephone box, don't give it a nice feel. The trees have outgrown the space and they've made it dark and overbearing both at street level and for the poor tenants living in those flats.
I can envisage a nice waist-high ivy-covered barrier forming a proper enclosure for Sylvan where they could still seat as many people as they do now. The additional feeling of airiness and openness that would be achieved by changing the trees would, IMO, more than compensate for a very slight reduction in the size of their dedicated sitting-out area, which, incidentally, doesn't belong to them (even though I'm glad they're putting it to good use).
Oh yeah, and there'd still be enough room to put a nice street bench adjacent for the odd fella who'd rather choose his tipple from a local convenience store.
Another vote for Anotherjohn's proposals on all fronts.
If I remember correctly, only about half the width of the area outside the Sylvan Post is currently used. I don't think much would be lost by putting in a loading bay, and putting in a nice barrier and more appropriate trees would make it nicer than it is now. But please will no one paint over our faux-Banksy street art (the telephone that looks like the wire comes out of a hole in the wall).
Deano - the point of the footbridge is that it would create a quick link from the large and underused car park in Perry Vale to the middle of Dartmouth Road. However, I agree that a costly footbridge would be using a hammer to crack a walnut. Living on that side of the tracks, I usually park there then walk through the subway. Up and over and down a footbridge further up Dartmouth Road wouldn't save me much time as I usually also need to go to the Post Office, the butchers, maybe the Teapot...
Having followed this thread I guess there is a conflict between what Dartmouth road represents, do we want it to be a vibrant shopping/cafe area or a drop off for the swimming pool/gym. Many years ago before the swimming pool was built I asked a council rep about the provision of car parking and was told they expected most people to come on public transport. I thought this was rubbish then and you only have to look at the cars after school and at weekends to see it is not the case now.
Any improvement to parking on Dartmouth Road will probably displace about 30 cars into the local streets which are already hammered by commuters, the schools and pools visitors. I doubt it will benefit the local shops but just make it easier for pool users to come and go without extra revenue for the local shops. Yes, you can build the best bridge in the world across the railway but if I can park my car nearer the swimming pool for free, I'll do it, you'll just waste money, you might as well turn Louise House into a multistorey car park keeping the frontage of course which would probably be a more pragmatic use of money.
I think we have to prioritise Dartmouth road for buses and restrict car usage.
Why did we save Louise House so we could put a big fence around it?
I don't see that conflict in your first sentence, borderpaul. I think we all want the same thing - to make the economy of Dartmouth Road thrive. The question is how we achieve it.
About the pool users - if they were parked on Dartmouth Road for a short time, might they not also become users of the shops and cafes? Alternatively, if you make the bays timed for, say an hour, that will be too short for most pool users, leVign the bay's for other users. Apart from at weekends, is the heaviest use of the pools after shopping hours are over in any case?
"Shared spaces" for drivers and pedestrians have appeared increasingly in our towns and cities.
They are places that try to make drivers take more care by removing traffic signs, pedestrian crossings and even kerbs.
A new report by former Paralympic swimmer Lord Holmes finds many people, including the visually impaired, are avoiding them.
I think we should be skeptical of any plans that try to improve pedestrian experience by removing the distinction between road and pavement, or suggest that crossings will be improved by making right of way ambiguous, particularly in narrow roads like Dartmouth Road.
I look forward to seeing more details of the plans for Dartmouth Road with clear indications about how pedestrians will be safer in the new design.
Sydenham High Street probably demonstrates the workability of the "shared spaces" thing. Even with the kerbs down, the boundaries seem to remain. I could be wrong, but from my own experiences down there, its not been a problem. I can see where the concerns lay, however I guess one why to look at the lowering of kerbs, is there is no high revving and lurching forward as people try and swing into a tight parking space.
Not sure who first came up with the idea of losing the kerbs, but I can see it from both sides.
It depends how you do it. You need to retain some visual sense of a boundary. The new paving and road surfacing in Bromley is an example of how NOT to do it. It looks beautiful - the paving and road surface are both made with the same honey-coloured paviers. Unfortunately, pedestrians are treating it as if it has been pedestrianised and are often entirely startled by cars, even though the cars have always been there, it's just the road surface that has changed. It doesn't help that there are blind corners. I drive VERY slowly along that section and often have to stop for people just walking out in front of me. People less familiar with the road won't be as cautious. And it's only a matter of time before someone is hit by one of the many buses swinging around the corner opposite the HSBC bank.
Here's a few pic's taken recently on Dartmouth Road which might be of interest.
- Today FH Pools were closed for a while and it's the first time I've saw no cars parked on this little strip, this may be a coincidence or not.
- Second accident I have witnessed in the past 6 months due to tripping on uneven pavements, this 59 year old lady ended up with a broken wrist and suspected dislocated hip and shoulder, the other I witnessed tripping at the same spot was a pensioner that ended up with a fractured skull. This spot is by no means the most uneven pavement on D Rd.
- Typical Sunday on D Rd when buses and emergency services cannot pass each other due to cars being parked on single yellow lines. Personally from seeing this time and time again I think it would be complete madness to narrow the Road.
But P1971, the problem as you point out is parking (permitted on Sundays and illegally done the rest of the week) blocking traffic flow.
Road width is irrelevant if there is the same yellow line arrangement and lack of adequate enforcement.
Double yellows all along the road (with the exception of proper parking bays of course) together with adequate enforcement is the only solution to this issue. With this, there would be none of the current traffic flow problems, either with the current road layout or a narrowed solution. Seeing as the narrowed solution provides improvements for pedestrians, I'm all in favour.
I see your point Brendon. This makes sense if double yellows are put in place with parking/loading bays for traders at that end of the Road with adequate enforcement, especially if it provides improvements for pedestrians.
Oh and I completely agree with AnotherJohns proposals. After all he's been part of Dartmouth Road for a very long time! FHDinosaur I think! Sorry Boss had to be said hahaha :-) Lucky I ain't posting a pic eh!
On Saturday I drove down the Dartmouth Road and stopped at the lights by the station and noticed that the right hand traffic signal was complely obscured by the pedestian light. It must have taken a lot of planning to achieve that. Remember this post when the first accident occurs and the drivers says "but I couldnt see the red signal".
This post was last modified: 03-08-2015 09:56 AM by Londondrz.
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Remember this post when the first accident occurs and the drivers says "but I couldnt see the red signal".
