Yet ANOTHER smash at black spot junction

Residents are up in arms after another smash today Saturday 13th May 2017 around 1830 at the junction of Bicester road and Somerton avenue, in North Sheen.

Following years of discussions with the council, double yellow lines were painted only a few weeks ago but according to residents, this is not satisfactory.

Two black Fords were seen on the crash scene, badly damaged and with airbags deployed, proof of the violence of the crash.

The two drivers, ironically going to a wedding and hen party, as well as a young passenger girl were shocked but unharmed.

A Met police car showed up but stayed less than 2 mn onsite after pushing one of the car which was obstructing the junction.

This junction has seen a number of crashes as cars fail to give way. Deficient signage could be a factor and Richmknd council has been working, for a while, on upgrading the painted yield lines into a stop sign.

On the crash site, Ludovic, a resident and witness to the crash commented:  "yellow lines actually make the problem worse as cars now travel faster across the junction. What we badly need is a raised junction."

According to another residents who preferred to remain anonymous, there are complaints that this junction and roads are "used as a rat run around Chalkers corner". In addition, local garage Westlake Motors, was mentioned as upsetting locals by frequently using roads to test their cars at speed.

Antidiots screen

On my way to work this Tuesday and on the M4, I saw no less than three minor accidents, merely some bumper to bumper action probably caused by bored distracted people and others who forgot to fill their petrol tanks? mechanical failures. That's life on a congested motorway, but more annoying are the rubbernecks kind.

They slow right down to check, ohhh nice flashing lights, ohhh creased bumper, ohhh woman standing behind safety barrier in the rain. And the re-accelerate, slowly, only to brake when they have caught up with preceding vehicles.

Nothing To Do With Arbroath "reports" that the Highways Agency is considering Giant screens at crash sites to end 'rubbernecking' danger. See the picture -doesn't need many more words.

Just that... by the time they've arrived, erected their 70 metres screen, etc... they'd have plenty of time to actually remove most, OK maybe not all, but most of the sources of distraction.

So I think this is another ill conceived idea from our DfT. What we need is not more powerless traffic wombles in their checkered green 4x4 but a fleet of rapid response plaform lorries, strategically placed along the motorway. They'd get rid of any hard-shoulder mishaps in minutes.

But that won't happen because it would be a far too sensible plan for the Department of Transport whose idea of transport is just about bulldozing houses to create more airport runways.

traffic, transportation, DfT, BAA, roads, automobile, richmondtransits.blog

What is the use of roadside census?

I happenned to be caught in tailbacks caused by a roadside census, like this one: Roadside census causes rush-hour chaos - Halifax Today.
It was in Lionel road, a busy cut-through to the M4 from Kew Brige.

I'm not sure what is the point of delaying people who already have a long journey?

They did not stop me, but if they did I would have declined to answer: no thanks to more traffic jams!

London, roads, traffic, transportation, richmondtransits.blog

Earth day: NOx, electric cars and diesel

I was listening to Robert Evans from Cenex, a company developping fuel-cell and "low carbon" (whatever that really means) technologies in this podcast on guardian.co.uk.

He suggests electric cars are THE solution (he would says that, would he not?) as they cut pullution. The interviewer doesn't buy this and questions if it's not just moving the pollution to coal fired plants (in the UK between 60% and 33% of the electricity is generated from coal and the 74% from fossil (can't seem to cross-reference 2 sources), 49% of electricity is made burning coal in the US, while in France 78.1% comes from nuclear in 2006).

Evans answered that moving the CO2 emission from tailpipes up to a power station chimney reduces NOx emissions. Which brings the whole issue I've been raising about diesel.

The goverment has been focussing solely on CO2 emissions, via car tax bands linked to emissions for instance (note that airlines and ships are exempt of fuel duty), which had the effect to favour diesel cars: oil burners registrations have grown from 13.8% in 1999 to 43.6% in 2008!

The problem is while diesel engines emit less CO2 (about 20-30%), they emit much more NOx and particulates, about 24 times more according to this source. While CO2 is not an actual pollutant, NOX and particulates are and are harmful to anyone in the vincinity of traffic -in particular children in urban environments.

Just another proof that the government is using CO2 as an excuse to tax with no proven ecological reasons.

UK, pollution, environment, diesel, automobile, globalwarming, richmondtransits.blog

More on Manor road and Heathrow

Seems now the government is embarrassed:

Decision on third runway delayed(BBC.co.uk)

"Anti-Heathrow expansion campaigners claim the government is stalling"

"A decision on whether a third runway
should be built at Heathrow Airport has been put back to January 2009,
the Department for Transport has said."

And also, the impact of the Airtrack on local level crossing is making into national news:

BBC NEWS | England | London | Rail link 'may cause longer wait'


Read also my previous post: Airtrack and North Sheen Crossing

richmond, north sheen, footbridge, north, sheen, rail, railways, uk, politics, transportation, heathrow, lhr, heathrowexpansion, ba, baa, dft, richmondtransits.blog

Traffic in Richmond park

Richmond park has come up with a way to limit the increasing Traffic in Richmond Park: The way forward for Case 17165.

In a nutshell, they're talking about closing the Pen Ponds (photo from Richmond Upon Thames Daily Photo) and putting a land train in place.

I find this just short of hypocritical and short sighted:

• hypocritical -if they want to restrict traffic to Pen Ponds, why then do they have a diesel-powered snack-food and ice cream van selling their wares there? (and also I wonder, why does it have a German licence plate?)
• short sighted -they've closed Robin Hood gate and displaced a lot of traffic onto adjoining roads, specifically the A205 is now quite terrible and the A3 was never improved either.

While I understand the reasons to restric traffic in the park, the "not in my street" approach is creating increased congestion on fewer streets each time a gate is closed, a street is made one way or transformed into a cul de sac (latest one to my knowledge is Well Lane in Sheen, which I find strange and not motivated)

Tags: car, traffic, richmond, park, richmondtransits.org