Pot Holes
In a recent news release it was announced that Bromley Council has been given an extra £225,000 to tackle potholes after the winter freezing conditions, and would welcome residents to let them know where the money needs spending.
It went on to say that the Council has already been dealing with hundreds of potholes after the bad weather and the “Beast from the East”. Holes have increased it’s understood the Council is in the middle of a longer term investment programme to catch up on the general resurfacing backlog. The extra cash from central government will help to top-up the emergency repairs budget and get our roads back in shape as soon as possible.
Here’s where Residents can help, so if you know of any damage that hasn’t yet been identified (it will normally have been marked out with spray paint) then let the council know – either using FixMyStreet or via the Council website.
Stuck in the Middle
Several residents again raised the problem of large lorries using the local roads. A large articulated lorry became stuck in Gates Green Road, and for most of the day, outside Wickham Common School. The driver seems to have realised too late that he was never going to fit down a country lane.
This isn’t the first time this has happened in the Wickham Common area. Previously a street tree was severely damaged by a lorry, leading to the Council’s legal team to pursue the company responsible. Also, Layhams Road and North Pole Lane have suffered from errant HGVs; a problem that appears to have been on the increase, partly because some haulage firms try to cut costs by using sat-nav maps designed only for smaller vehicles.
The Council has previously worked with mapmakers to ensure that roads unsuitable for HGVs are marked as such in sat-nav data, but clearly more needs to be done. We are now taking the issue up with the Council’s highways officers, including improving the signage at vulnerable junctions such as Gates Green Road/Croydon Road, Kingsway and others.
Railway Services : Hayes Line
You may have seen recent report that Rail services from Hayes to Cannon Street are set to change and cease under plans set out by the Department for Transport (DfT) late last year. However in new tendering proposals DfT is putting out to Rail companies for the South Eastern rail franchise from April 2019 with the major changes will be coming in December 2022. Especially in the the bid specification affecting the Hayes line demands the Hayes to Charing Cross service should run non-stop from Ladywell to London Bridge with, optionally, stops at Lewisham only in rush hour. However, a new service to Victoria will also commence which will include Lewisham stops and open up a wider range of South London stations such as Denmark Hill (for Kings College Hospital). There appear to be no plans for a Cannon Street service.
It would seem that plans to expand Bakerloo underground line to Hayes, from TFL which would have seen an end to any direct services to either London Bridge or the City. Those plans now appear to have been subsequently shelved.
The new plans, come from central government and it is hoped we will still see the more direct City link severed, though a London Bridge connection remains allowing changes for Cannon Street as well as Blackfriars and beyond with the completion of the new London Bridge station. The technical justification for the changes is to reduce train congestion around Lewisham and so make for more reliable services.
Old Hayes High Street
Residents making their way to Bromley will be interested in a road scheme that will widen the road, as well as controlling parking, especially at the key bottleneck points, this should ensure that traffic including buses will be able to pass more freely through the street without encouraging speeding.
The road will be widened by up to a metre from a point near the war memorial down towards the rectory on the church side, while parking will be restricted on the same side from near George Lane, again down to the rectory. The plans, will be combined with a scheduled resurfacing in the early summer
Lets hope that the Council looks at the problem of congestion along the section of the road near Bromley Football Club leading to Ravensbourne School
