Forum Topic

TfL confirms OneChiswick's legal challenge is over

https://chiswickcalendar.co.uk/tfl-confirms-onechiswick-has-withdrawn-cycleway-9-legal-challenge/ What a week it has been: OneChiswick ends its pursuit of a JR against Cycleway9 Works start on the cycle lane across the north side of the Hammersmith gyratory Upgrading works start on the Chiswick High Road Cycleway 9 between Goldhawk and Chiswick Lane LBHF announces a swing from 86% opposition to 92% support in one year for the South Fulham LTN which will now be made permanent with rumours leaking that residents are demanding a new LTN on the west side of Wandsworth Bridge Road having seen the transformational benefits for their neighbours on the east side.  What have I missed? 

Paul Campbell ● 1758d24 Comments

Three more items, Paul:• TfL announced funding has been approved extending C9 west further into Brentford.  • Hounslow West cycle lane opened over the weekend. • It looks like the beginning of the end for any prospect of the cars crossing Hammersmith Bridge - see the front page story.Those who might be tempted to claim that this last development is going to destroy retail in Barnes might pause to read the recent report by the Barnes Community Association."In spite of the pandemic, footfall in Barnes High Street is at a five year high.  Businesses are opening up in the village on a daily basis and we are confident that if we continue to deliver positive projects such as the parklet and the High Street improvements, Barnes will continue to thrive."Those positive projects were the rest of a consultation that "showed that 69% of residents support the removal of parking in the High Street to bring wider benefits.  61% of the 364 residents and businesses who responded to the Council’s consultation supported the proposals. Only 27% indicated that they drive to the High Street. The remaining 73% wanted improvements for pedestrians and cyclists."Good news all round for cleaner, more sustainable and more vibrant living in Chiswick and beyond.

Tom Pike ● 1758d

It's not all good news for tfl and his twerpship though - https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/dec/01/tfl-halts-road-safety-ad-london-victim-blaming-cyclist-groups-backlash

peter king ● 1758d

What? A bridge closed to cars, traffic went down and they took out parking spaces for parklets (opposite a park!!!!) and footfall went up? And then businesses did better and people liked it and wanted more of the same. Mad lot south of the river.

Paul Campbell ● 1758d

It's happening both sides of the river, Paul. Chiswick Flower Market, like Barnes Community Association, shows what progressive community organisations can achieve. They have both clearly demonstrated the vision that is required to significantly shift the dial in favour of local retail.Though it might take a little longer for its leaders to accept, OneChiswick has only succeeded in showing it is both ineffective and irrelevant.

Tom Pike ● 1758d

Dear Tom,Your assertions about Barnes do not follow for Chiswick. I have seen a substantial drop in my business because clients in Barnes cannot reach me at all, and clients in Chiswick are unable to manage the traffic and congestion, so they have simply cancelled.  What you see as "good news" is destroying my livelihood.  I hope you're proud of yourself.Amanda x

Amanda Smith ● 1757d

Imperial has shut down its courses in Petroleum Engineering. Those jobs are going and the whole industry is going to have to shift completely or die. The alternative would be to continue to train people how to extract the fossil fuels that are damaging the environment for all of us.

Tom Pike ● 1757d

Could this be the end of forum wars. Gone very quite given 4 hrs have lapsed

Julian Pavey ● 1757d

Whether or not you support C9 or the full repair of Hammersmith Bridge both projects have laid bare the gross ineptitude of those responsible for managing these works.Construction of C9 has been woeful and the repair of the bridge has and is a very unfunny comedy.One despairs.

Adrian Irving ● 1757d

Seems a bit unfair to lay the blame for the Hammersmith Bridge problem squarely at those managing the works. The fundamental issue in this case is surely the unwillingness of the government to fund the reopening.On the issue of the legal case against C9 the last we heard from One Chiswick was that the were holding fire until they saw the new traffic order. As far as I am aware this new order hasn't been issued.One Chiswick do seem to lack a bit of transparency allowing their opponents to repeat insinuations against them which do seem baseless but in the constant repetition some may come to believe. It may be that their plans are being clearly explained on Facebook but, like more that have the population I don't do Facebook, so I don't know what they are.

Francis Rowe ● 1757d

Francis, I think the members of the OneChiswick Facebook group will be as in the dark as everyone else regarding their plans unless they are part of an unnamed 'inner circle'.Even when information was posted on the OneChiswick Facebook group that the claim was finished, this was subsequently denied on the OneChiswick website.The legal action is being brought by OneChiswick Ltd and in companies house public records, the name associated with this is a Robert Austin as director.  He is a resident of Richmond and is also the director of 32 other companies.The only other names referenced in the company documents are the signatories of the statement of guarantee, a Asal Chaharsough-Shirazi and a Michael Ormrod.Their funding webpage originally had a Marlene Johnson as named beneficiary but this was subsequently changed to  'OneChiswick'.

Michael Robinson ● 1757d

Why would the Government pay? Responsibility for bridge maintenance is not theirs.

Mark Warburton ● 1757d

If OneChiswick aren't saying perhaps you could explain to me what is the significance of the 'revelation' from TfL? My understanding is that any question of legal action against the original traffic order ended when Hounslow withdrew it some months ago. Therefore nothing has happened that we didn't already know was going to happen.Are you saying that OneChiswick has given up on action on the new traffic order as well perhaps on the basis that Hounslow's changes have undermined many of the legal issues that were being challenged in the original scheme?

Francis Rowe ● 1757d

Francis, I know nothing other than the information in the TfL commissioner's report.I don't know the OneChiswick grounds for a claim and if the changes meant that these grounds were no longer applicable or at least would be very hard to win.  Even if so, they may still need to formally withdraw the claim and it appears they have now done so.  A statement on the OneChiswick website dated 3 November said they hadn't withdrawn the claim and were "still waiting...  for the London Borough of Hounslow’s next steps". This contradicted a previous post on OneChiswick Facebook group.https://chiswickcalendar.co.uk/lb-hounslow-mark-up-chiswick-high-rd-in-preparation-for-cycleway-9-changes/OneChiswick did have a date for a hearing in June and they asked to delay this until later in the year.  It looks like they gambled that the appeal for the taxi Bishopsgate Judicial Review  and other Judicial Reviews in Lambeth and Hackney would produce a result favourable to them but TfL and the boroughs won all of them.  If this was a gamble, then it failed and provided more time to avoid a hearing altogether.Even if there had been a hearing and OneChiswick had won their claim, the likely outcome would have been for the council to just re-do documentation or parts of the process. This happened in Poole recently when local campaigners won a Judicial Review against the council who re-opened a road after it had been closed during Covid.  In addition to getting costs, the remedy was just to re-do the consultation, not actually close the road again.

Michael Robinson ● 1757d

"The council hopes that the changes made will make C9T less vulnerable to a legal challenge by the OneChiswick campaign group which argued previously that the early design significantly disadvantaged the elderly and the disabled and that the council had not fulfilled its statutory responsibilities to those groups. OneChiswick had sought a Judicial Review of the previous traffic order and now says it will be studying the new one when issued to assess grounds for a new legal challenge." The above is from a front page article on the 17th last.One has to wonder if the council got out of bed one morning and realised that the existing C9 layout was woeful and thought something must be done or blooming heck we going to get screwed by a legal challenge hence the scramble to dig up and put right their mistakes. Who knows.I will let you, dear reader, make up your own mind.

Adrian Irving ● 1757d

Given the current work is installing precisely the cycleway scheme east of Chiswick Lane as originally planned and consulted on prior to the pandemic, the answer is neither.A temporary scheme was installed early when the need and opportunity arose during the pandemic, and this is now being replaced with the original design as new funding becomes available. Given the increase in cycling last year, the temporary schemes, mostly deployed on urban roads, performed the vital role of protecting cyclists. That’s not conjecture, as we now know that last year saw a 40% increase in cyclist fatalities, but that spike was confined to rural A roads where little extra protection was provided.

Tom Pike ● 1757d

OneChiswick could have had the hearing in June.You will need to ask them why they chose to delay it.

Michael Robinson ● 1757d

Tom, Thank's for your input.Let's face facts. The council rammed through a dangerous, unworkable path between Goldhawk Road and Chiswick Lane and trying to defend that decision on any grounds is ridiculous.Any objective person could see the glaring problems that the council created by doing this. Thank goodness they are now waking up to them. No left turn into Chiswick Lane being one of the main ones.However, whatever their motivation, I am pleased that C9 is now being relayed  in the way it should have been from day one.

Adrian Irving ● 1757d

Well, as previously discussed we rarely hear from them but your reasoning makes sense. If there was a looming judgement that would have had a bearing on the review they were probably advised to postpone the hearing.I'm still struggling to see any significance in the TfL announcement - they have merely confirmed the formal closing of a case that was defunct anyway because the order was superseded. OneChiswick still have the option to ask for a JR into the new traffic order but they may have run out of money or been advised that it was unlikely to be successful.With much of Cycleway 9 closed until next Easter there really isn't any way to judge on its success or otherwise until it reopens and then at least three months will be required to make even the sketchiest assessment. Unless OneChiswick have a crafty injunction up their sleeve then nothing much seems likely to happen.

Francis Rowe ● 1757d

OneChiswick made their claim before the initial Bishopsgate judgement.  The facts in each case will not be the same so I'd have thought they would need to be confident about their claim on its own merits rather than relying on something that they didn't know about when making the claim in the first place.  Maybe they weren't confident hence delaying and hoping that another ruling would come to their rescue.I think it was reasonable to assume that the case was defunct but without knowing the grounds of the claim it wasn't possible to say for sure.  Certainly OneChiswick Ltd themselves weren't saying that it was defunct.

Michael Robinson ● 1757d

By definition the case would be defunct if the ETO which was being challenged was superseded - which it has been or is about to be.

Francis Rowe ● 1757d

As an LBHF council tax payer who is mildly inconvenienced by Hammersmith Bridge being closed to vehicular traffic, I'd much rather the bridge stayed shut to vehicular traffic if reopening it resulted in a huge burden on LBHF.The majority of people who drove over it when it was still open probably didn't live in LBHF, and it's a historical accident that LBHF owns the bridge.

Andrew Jones ● 1757d

Paul and Tom -Would you kindly point us all to the new Chiswick parklets?In other news, they took down the tree outside the Best Western today.

David Lesniak ● 1757d

Mark, the short answer to your question is that the cost of repairing the bridge is much the same size as the council's annual budget so only the government can practically pay for the work that is needed.

Jeremy Parkinson ● 1757d

"Could this be the end of forum wars."Nope! They fight on "within new parameters" (whatever that means - probably without any money or the semblance of structure that the JR provided). "'tis but a scratch".Like the Monty Python Black Knight who has been systematically de-limbed they will bite our legs off.

Paul Campbell ● 1756d