Letter: Still Some Concerns on Planned Consultation for London Road Cycle Scheme

Published on: 28 Jun, 2023
Updated on: 28 Jun, 2023

London Road meeting in January 2023.

From: Fiona Davidson

Surrey County Councillor (R4GV, Guildford South-East)

In response to Letter: What Next for the London Road Cycle Scheme

Unfortunately, I can’t answer all Pat Gallagher’s questions in his recent letter to The Dragon on the London Road Active Travel Scheme, but I can provide a progress report. Interested readers can find lots more information on the London Road Action Group (LRAG) website.

The second meeting of the Sustainable Transport Reference Group (STRG), set up by Surrey County Council  (SCC) with the remit of helping SCC shape an engagement process for future engagement with the community, was held on June 21.

The group comprises representatives from various residents’ associations in the London Road area, schools, G-BUG, Guildford Borough Council, the Surrey Coalition of Disabled People, and bus operators, amongst others. Sadly, no-one representing businesses in Guildford has attended either of the first two meetings, although the Surrey Chambers of Commerce has been invited.

Following my request, at this meeting we were able to view the plans for the whole London Road scheme, although technical details had not been included. We were assured that the technical drawings would be made available before a design workshop, which is planned.

So, what have we learned so far?

The drawings show that the scheme has been extended past the Waterden Road / York Road junction with London Road up to Alexandra Terrace (past G Live), at the junction with the Upper High Street. This came as something of a surprise as it had not been mooted previously. We were told that a decision on this extension will be made in the next month or so.

The current plan is to run three further sessions with the STRG to discuss the proposed implementation, and two workshops to look at the details of the design and the implementation before engagement with the public in September and October.

Some design and implementation concerns raised on January 5 have been addressed, others are outstanding. The LRAG website provides further information.

The form of the public engagement has not yet been determined, but is likely to include drop-in sessions and a social media campaign. The public will be able to provide feedback on SCC’s Commonplace.is platform. The views of STRG participants will influence how the plans are presented and brought alive. A virtual reality model of the Dutch roundabout has already been commissioned.

In describing the new public consultation as an engagement, SCC has stressed that this time around the consultation exercise will be qualitative, not quantitative. A survey is not planned.

The engagement in September / October will cover the whole London Road scheme – from New Inn Lane to either Waterden / York Road or Alexandra Terrace.

The work of the STRG continues, so it would be premature to draw any definite conclusions about plans and the engagement process.

However, I am concerned that the views of those most impacted by the plans will be drowned by the scale of the engagement that appears to be under consideration.

The previous consultation cited positive support for the scheme based on a very limited telephone survey of residents living within 2km of London Road, and a focus group with a large number of residents living elsewhere in Surrey.

I’m concerned we may have come full circle, just with a much larger audience.

SCC is currently unable to confirm how the views of those directly impacted, including the residents, businesses, and schools local to London Road, will be accurately captured and reported during the proposed engagement.

I hope this significant limitation will be remedied so that local residents can be confident that their views really count!

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