The council reply follows......I will add comments later but generally I'm less than impressed.

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Thank you for your email.

I am sorry to hear of the incident you describe.

The Council recently carried out works to improve road safety at this location. These works included a realignment of the carriageway, the introduction of a speed indicator device (SID) the construction of speed tables, islands and kerb build outs. We also introduced parking restrictions. Sight lines around the bend in the road have been improved, as has pedestrian safety, by this recent widening of the footway and remodelling of the carriageway. Pedestrian improvements have been made along the length of road by the subway and these include a wider pavement, narrower carriageway, better crossing at the car park entrance and a flat topped speed reducing table by the subway where people want to cross. Prior to this work pedestrians crossed here unaided.

Enforcement of the speed limit is a matter for the Police. I would suggest that perhaps residents approach the Police to see if they could carry out some speed or other driving enforcement.

In the meantime officers will look into whether there is a personal injury accident problem at this location. Unfortunately damage only accidents are not used in data for traffic management schemes. This is because there is no reliable means of obtaining the data as often accidents are not reported to Police or insurers and there is therefore no means of assessing possible causes. If the Police confirm that there have been personal injury accidents our engineers will look further at the scheme to determine whether there are any further physical measures that could be considered. If so funding for a scheme would need to be sought from Transport for London, who fund almost almost of the traffic management measure in the borough. A reduction in personal injury accidents is one of the criteria for finding applications.

With regard to the provision of a crossing; I am afraid the Council cannot introduce a pedestrian crossing at that location because the sight lines are not good enough. In other words pedestrians and vehicles approaching the crossing would not be able to see each other from a sufficient distance to allow vehicles to slow down and stop safely. However we recognise that this is the 'desire line' where people want to cross. That's why the engineers put a in flat top table as an informal crossing protected by speed cushions on either side of it to slow traffic down. A stretch of guard railing has been installed to encourage pedestrians to cross at the edge of the table where sightlines are best.

I'm afraid that other than extending the guardrailing to prevent people crossing too close to the bend there is little more we can do to improve the situation. Any design to install a formal crossing at this point would not pass a safety audit, and indeed would be likely to make the crossing less rather than more safe. This is because pedestrians tend to perceive formal crossings as safer and therefore take less care when crossing.

I have asked for parking enforcement in this area to be stepped up.

I hope this information is useful.
regards

Imogen Payami
Casework - Transport