Rachel writes…

Make a difference in Upton Lane
Monday 20th March, 5.30pm – 7pm
Pie Republic , 80 Upton Lane, London, E7 9LW

Do you have an idea for a community event or group? Come to our drop-in and find out more about the funding and support available from Newham so you can make it happen. Meet local councillors, meet other interested residents and get the information you need to make a difference to your local area.

For more details, or if you are interested but cannot make this event, please contact:
glennette.bowlesdove@newham.gov.uk
or call 0203 373 8382 or 07817 385000

Now, those who have been reading this blog closely, or those who are as fascinated by ward boundaries as we are, will notice that this is taking place in Forest Gate South, not North. Avid readers will also remember that I am no longer lead councillor for Forest Gate (Forest Gate North and South). This is all true. But whilst I was lead councillor, a drop-in surgery in Upton Lane was one of the things I was planning. And we’d even got a date in the diary, so it seemed churlish to cancel once there had been a reorganisation.

The idea was prompted by several things. Firstly, exactly like our drop-in in Maryland last year, by the idea that the constant availability of Let’s Get the Party Started funding, and Go for It grants is all very well, but it’s also great to get out and talk to people about them, and to focus on a particular area. Also, there was some discussion in a break out session at the Faith Conference last year from participants from Upton Lane that they would like to see some more community events there, and in particular they wondered if there could be an Upton Lane food festival. I thought this was a great idea, but also an ambitious one, and that trying to encourage some smaller community action would be a useful first step.

So here we are. We’ve printed leaflets that have gone out to the surrounding area, but I thought I’d blog about it too. If you live on or around Upton Lane and you are free, please do pop into Pie Republic tomorrow to buy a hot drink, say hello, and chat with me, Mas Patel, and officers about how you could get involved in creating a group or holding an event. Or just pop in to say hi. I hope to see some of you there.

Rachel writes…

For ages now, I’ve been meaning to do some advocacy on behalf of all Forest Gate residents who feel frustrated by the train service. As I mentioned in my ward report, we’ve been hit by various overlapping bits of work and overunning work: temporary stairs, weekend closures,  poor service at rush hour, delays to the ‘Goblin line’ improvements, and delays to the work at Forest Gate too.

Although I appear to be included on every single email update and bulletin list for any kind of train news (for which I try very hard to be grateful), I do still have difficulty sometimes getting straight in my head exactly who is responsible for what: the service from Forest Gate to Liverpool Street, the new Elizabeth Line, the station improvements, the Overground service from Wanstead Park, the electrification works on that line… I rang up one of the people from my email inbox and got some useful contact details but not much more. So it was with no small amount of gratitude that I read an email from Vicky, a local resident who’d taken matters into her own hands one morning, bumped into someone official looking from MTR Crossrail at the station, and arranged a meeting with him to which she invited me along as well. That was last Friday, it was chucking it down with rain, and we quickly decamped to everyone’s favourite mobile office, CoffeE7 for tea and some questions.

The man we met was Julian Dixon, Head of Security and Community Engagement at MTR Crossrail. We had a very helpful discussion and, although I didn’t take notes on everything, I wanted to summarise some of the main points here.

One of the first points that he made was about the increased footfall and use of the trains, how this is leading to overcrowding, and how the new carriages that are being brought in will help with this. The current trains that go from Forest Gate station are apparently 38 years old (a splendid age to be, by the way. In case you were wondering.)  From the end of May they will be bringing in one new train every 2 weeks, which means that very gradually we will see more and more of the new trains on our service. They not only have a bigger capacity, but they also have three sets of doors, which should reduce the amount of time we all spend banging on the windows begging people to move down. Eventually the service will use the new trains, with 9 carriages rather than the current 7, which will almost double the capacity on each train*. With the additional train services on the Elizabeth line, this will make a huge difference to us.

Another improvement with the new 3 door carriages is that currently people often pull the passenger alarm if they are concerned that they can’t get off the train at their station. This has a huge knock-on effect on later trains. The new trains are easier to exit, with much stronger doors, and the alarms can also be reset from the driver’s cab.

We asked about giving people better information, and made the point that station closures often happen very quickly, with no notice, no information about how long the closure is likely to last. It appears that relatively junior staff trying to manage angry crowds of commuters are doing the best they can, but don’t have access to much information. We particularly emphasised that if people know before they leave home, say from twitter, that the service is delayed or getting overcrowded, they might choose a different route into work, perhaps walking to Stratford for example, rather than heading to the station and being frustrated.

We suggested better information for staff, early information on twitter, and a sign or board on the cabin at the station that people could see as they approached it. Some of that was in Julian’s power to influence, and some wasn’t. Transport for London, for example, run the twitter information, and information about how the service is running has to fit into the predefined categories that we all know from the boards at underground stations: ‘good service’, ‘slight delays’ etc. But he is going to take our plea for better information on twitter back to TfL, and especially took on board our points about early information helping people in their journeys, and limiting frustration. He’s also going to speak to colleagues about the idea of a board at the station.

We also talked about improving information for residents generally about the works at the station, how they are coming along, when people can expect key milestones to be finished, and giving more information generally as residents are interested. Vicky made the great point that Forest Gate residents want to be positive about the improvements – we know that Crossrail will bring huge benefits, but it’s hard to feel positive when everything is over-running, weekend closures seem never ending, and the temporary arrangements are so inconvenient.

We talked about information on boards at the station, and also discussed holding an information event at the Gate one evening for any interested residents. Julian was really keen on this, especially on arranging something jointly with TfL, and we left feeling really positive about the prospect of setting up something where residents could bring their questions and queries, and we could all learn more about the work going on, what’s been achieved thus far, and what we can look forward to.

Reading through my notes there were a few other things we touched upon. Since Julian’s responsibility is both community engagement but also security, he told us how many of the station improvements will improve the safety of the line. Sadly where lines are accessible, there is a risk of people getting onto the tracks, either by accident or when they attempt suicide, and over the last 21 months TfL staff have saved 61 lives as part of their suicide prevention work. He also said that crime on the local line is relatively very low, and although there has been an increase nationally in crime on the railways, there has been a 5% drop on our line.

Overall, it was a very useful chat, and I’m particularly hoping that we can make the session at the Gate happen. There is plenty more inconvenience to come on the train, and Seyi and I will keep finding out more, hassling people, and posting more information here and on twitter.

*I will check this, as I wrote down that capacity would be nearly doubled, but Vicky remembers it as ‘50% increased’. Obviously there’s a big difference between it doubling, or going up by 50%, but either way, once we have not only new carriages, but 9 carriage trains, there’ll be much more space.

Introduction

This is my councillor report for January and February 2017. It’s primarily written as a means of being accountable to the Forest Gate North Labour members who selected me, but I also publish it (here!) on our councillors’ blog which is available to all Forest Gate North residents – and indeed anyone else at all who is interested. When the ward’s membership grew so much after Jeremy Corbyn’s election as leader, we decided to start reporting more formally to the ward, as this seemed more appropriate than informal catch ups. Previous ward reports from me and Seyi are published online here as well. If you read our blog regularly, there might be some overlap with blog posts, for which my apologies!

Casework

Casework continues steadily, with a regular stream of questions, complaints, and contacts via surgery, email, twitter, Facebook and blog comments. Housing continues to be a very difficult issue for many residents affected by rising rents, with some heartbreaking stories, and I’ve also seen another small spike in planning casework recently, I think due to the rash of loft conversions! I’ve been dealing with casework about litter and fly tipping – liaising with officers to make sure streets aren’t missed, and trying to pick up on small errors that are understandable but preventable which can be frustrating. Casework takes up so much time, but is so important to the residents it affects, and I probably do at least some casework every single day (and some days it’s all I do!). I try here to give a quick flavour of any trends, but obviously I don’t give any identifying information about the individuals involved.

It can be frustrating, but can also be surprisingly satisfying or even moving when you find a solution, or when persistence suddenly opens up a new option, when you link someone up with someone else, or point someone in the right direction. I was touched and moved by a resident who came to my surgery one Saturday with a box of chocolates and a card for me, to thank me for ending the stalemate she’d been in regarding the extension for her disabled son.

Parking

The RPZ for Forest Gate North began on December the 5^th, and with some caveats I would say that it is going well. We have certainly received lots of direct positive feedback, both formally via emails and informally through the school gate and social contact. There has been a noticeable decrease in the number of cars parked, no more long-term abandoned vehicles, and the introduction of double yellow lines around junctions has been very beneficial, especially on our narrower streets which were previously often unsafe.

That said, we are in discussion with some residents about the specifics of the design around them. Many changes were made at the consultation stage, but there are always residents who aren’t able to contribute at that point, and make their suggestions after the lines have gone in. I have a petition about parking on Forest Street, and ongoing casework regarding parking around Capel Point. In response to some strong feelings about the introduction of footway parking (where bays are marked so that cars can park partly on the pavement and partly on the road) we are organising some canvassing around Cemetery Road to specifically ask local residents about the parking there, and to ask what their thoughts are on removing at least one bay.

We are in touch with Redbridge asking them to introduce some form of parking restriction on Centre Road, which has become increasingly unsafe as drivers who wish to avoid the parking restrictions in Forest Gate leave their vehicles there. We did in fact contact Redbridge during the initial consultation, and I’ve been in touch with councillors and with officers in parking design there. I’m going to have one final go, then discuss with Seyi and Anam whether we might get together a petition or similar to ask them to take action.

Enforcement and Fly Tipping

We had an update from Enforcement at a Community Neighbourhood meeting last month which I blogged about in detail here: https://forestgatenorth.com/2017/02/20/an-enforcement-update/

There is lots of great work going on, including cracking down on the misuse of disabled badges, working with police to stop the sex trade that is the root cause of the stickers that blight our lamp posts, an example of stopping fly posting, issuing the new PCNs to fly tippers. I was most interested though, in the proactive work that took place to visit every commercial premises on a primary route to check they had a trade waste agreement. After the work Seyi and I did with Enforcement on the marketplace in Forest Gate, I was really struck by how one of the sources of fly tipping is commercial premises who either don’t have arrangements for their waste, or who are over producing, or not managing their commercial bins. This huge piece of work should help to stop an enormous source of fly tipping before it even reaches our streets.

The alleyway opposite Forest Gate station has also been the subject of work by Enforcement, who are working with the landlord to improve the appearance of it. It’s privately owned, and also the access point to some flats and businesses, which makes it problematic. I understand the landlord is investigating getting a gate (notwithstanding the access issues) and I am also asking if Newham street cleaners could clean just inside the alleyway, which is technically not Newham land, just because litter blows in there, and it’s so unsightly.

Speaking of litter, my girls and I attended the Manor Park litter pick on Sunday. If you have never been, I would heartily recommend it – a blustery morning out in the fresh air making Wanstead Flats look nicer, and a free hot drink and some lovely chat in the Golden Fleece afterwards. Wanstead Flats was much clearer of litter than it has been in the past, no doubt partly due to the extra resources the Corporation of London has put in. This did lead to a strange dynamic where my girls were a bit disappointed not to find more, “Where’s all the litter, Mummy?” There was a record number of people out, and (after some determined searching) we filled many bags that the Corporation took away. This is just one example of the community activity we are so lucky to have here.

Improving our streets

We have all been receiving feedback on the condition of our roads and pavements, and as the programme to resurface and repair all our roads continues, we will keep seeing improvements here. Leonard Road, Essex Street, Suffolk Street and Norfolk Street amongst others have all now been done, with Sebert Road expected in the next couple of months. We also have a schedule of roads planned for the next year or two, which I will publish on the blog.

I’m also excited to find out more about some smaller-scale regeneration work that is planned by officers in Forest Gate, which I don’t yet know anything more about but will keep everyone in the loop about. The ‘Linear Gateway’ work (https://forestgatenorth.com/2016/07/11/smartening-up-woodgrange-road-and-upton-lane/ ) to ask shops to comply with byelaws and smarten up their shop fronts has been a great success, with some buildings almost unrecognisable once repainted and repaired, and more sympathetic and appealing shop fronts appearing everywhere. Enforcement notices for those shops that haven’t complied are going out as I type.

Pop up surgeries

Seyi, Anam and I are planning or hoping to hold pop-up surgeries over the next few months in Maryland, Woodgrange Road Mosque, and at the Saturday school in the Lodge in Forest Lane Park. We want to use these as a way of being ‘where people are’, meeting people who cannot come to or aren’t aware of our Saturday morning surgeries. If you are running or aware of a community event where one or more of us could come along, and hold a pop-up surgery where people can speak to us about the Council then please let any of us know. I’m also organising a drop-in session on Upton Lane along with Mas Patel and the Forest Gate South councillors. This is to respond to some ideas from the Newham Faith conference where some business owners wondered if an Upton Lane Food Festival could happen. We are going to see if we can encourage a community event in that area, a Let’s Get the Party Started street party or similar, and whether following that residents might want to get together to think about a food festival or indeed anything else to celebrate the diverse businesses there.

Trains

Issues with the trains continue, with Forest Gaters being hit by  temporary stairs, weekend closures,  poor service at rush hour, delays to the ‘Goblin line’ improvements, and delays to the work at Forest Gate too. I’m in touch with National Rail and TfL advocating for us – essentially saying that I want them to take account of the cumulative impact of the work going on, on two separate lines, with delays and overlapping closures. There is something of a bun fight currently happening between TfL and National Rail about the Goblin line, and my response to that is that I don’t really care whose fault it is, I just need to know that the needs of residents to use trains are being considered in the round. I’m meeting with a representative from Crossrail on Friday, and will report back.

The consultation on the landscaping aspects of the improvements around the station has ended. We should have final plans soon, which I anticipate will include more planting, ‘planter’ style bicycle parking, as well as really high quality pavement and road surfaces, traffic calming, additional public realm, electrical points for the market, and more. We’ll have to go through some pain with roadworks to make all of these changes, but I’ll ask to be kept abreast of these, and will publicise them and push back to reduce the impact as much as I can.

Strategic Development Committee

Strategic Development Committee has been increasingly busy, with three hour meetings no longer uncommon, meeting papers of over 300 pages (and more) and extra meetings being scheduled to deal with the number of major development applications received. After something of a baptism of fire into the world of planning, I can feel myself becoming increasingly familiar with the terms and the legal restrictions, and also with the dynamic between officers, developers and members, and the (I hope) useful ways that as members we can help to express the priorities of our residents and shape the borough. At a pre-application forum where applications are discussed I have spoken very strongly to developers about the importance of engaging with officers and with our Design Review Panel, about the need for affordable family accommodation, of creating streets that are lively and enjoyable and safe, and creating green spaces that are not ‘curated’ and formal but are instead open to residents to enjoy. Doing so gives officers more strength to go back and continue their robust negotiations in the pre-application stage, getting the maximum amount of value for Newham out of the developments proposed.

At the last meeting, the application for 39 – 49 Woodgrange Road was presented, and then deferred. The reason for the deferral was concerns about parking, but I and other members expressed a number of other concerns based on the design we saw on that night, including the design of the building, the density, the lack of family accommodation, and the lack of affordable accommodation on site. I am not opposed to new developments, I’m not opposed to sympathetic modern design on a Victorian high street, and I think this space on Woodgrange Road is a prime site for something that offers some retail and residential, but I was glad that this iteration of the application was deferred and hope that the developer will go away and do some more work on it before it comes back.

Forest Gate Community Neighbourhood

Although I am no longer Lead Councillor for Forest Gate, this change has only happened recently so I have spent much of the last two months doing work with the staff at the Gate to help shape and direct their work. I am hoping to hold a networking meeting on Homelessness, a chance for interested and concerned residents to link up with local groups who are doing great work here, and similarly to hold an event about Play Streets, to encourage more to be set up to provide street space for children to play. We are also putting together the Community Plan for next year.

There are huge numbers of activities happening at the Gate, including life drawing, drop-in IT support, a lego club, a Science club, film screenings, and more. If you’re on twitter, I often tweet flyers of what is happening, and information about all of these things is available from staff at the Gate.

Temporary housing project

I’ve been in regular touch with an ex-Forest Gate resident who is now working with the North Newham Learning Partnership, and especially with Kay Row, looking at whether they can set something up to help support families in Forest Gate who are in temporary accommodation. She is proposing providing a space for families who have been placed in Newham by other boroughs, often who are in very poor quality accommodation. This space would give the parents and children a spae to play, access to cooking and laundry facilities, and the dedicated support which would help them to be able to access universal services such as the children’s centres offer. This is a potentially really exciting project, with some of the families in our area who are in the greatest need. I’ve been putting Jane in touch with various people, including local community and faith groups who are doing work with homeless people, and linking her up with people in the Council who can consider whether they commission the work.

Living Streets

With Thom Sanders, another Labour member, I am jointly setting up a Newham branch of Living Streets, which is the national organisation that campaigns for pedestrians. I’m doing this in my personal capacity but I mention it because my interest in Living Streets has been borne partly out of my councillor contact with the brilliant Newham Cyclists, but also from my work on the Strategic Development Committee where I have become increasingly interested in how good planning can help to create really vibrant and safe public spaces and streets. After attending some training on creating streets, I thought that it would be useful to bring together voices in Newham to help amplify this view, and I’m hoping Newham Living Streets will do this. If you are interested, please come to our first meeting, on March the 8^th at the Gate at 6.30pm . Or you can join our email list by emailing newhamlivingstreets@gmail.com

Licensing

I was contacted by a resident of Dames Road, concerning the Forest Glen pub, and the disturbances that local people had been suffering. After contacting Licensing, I realised that because of the volume of complaints to the Noise and Nuisance team, they had requested a licensing review, which was underway. Frankly, as a representative, this was totally brilliant news, as it meant that residents had been consistently reporting, and the number of reports meant that the officers had a robust evidence base to take action. I often speak to residents all over the ward who are suffering from disturbances, who have suffered in silence for a long time, and only begin to approach the Council or others once they have reached the end of their tether, and are then frustrated by the processes necessary to collect evidence. (In fact, I blogged about this here: https://forestgatenorth.com/2017/01/23/report-it/ )

In this case, I encouraged the resident in question to speak to his neighbours, and he did so, and collected signatures on a petition. I spoke to officers in Licensing, read through the evidence from Noise and Nuisance (which made dismal reading, as it outlined a long litany of disturbances and flouting of the existing licence conditions). Having done this, Seyi and I submitted a joint response to the review, in which we strongly argued that the evidence suggested the licence should be revoked.

As I write this, the licensing hearing was last night, and although it took some time, it was a very diligent process with evidence from officers, information from the licence holder, a submission from me, some very persistent and insightful questioning from the chair of the panel and others, and around 7 residents in attendance which is extremely rare at these hearings. Licensing takes place under a specific legal framework, which requires reasoned and proportionate decisions, and giving the licence holder a chance to make the situation better, but I was thrilled that at the end the result was the licence was revoked. A real result for residents.

Cllrs’ development training

I attended a weekend’s training for female Labour councillors that was put on by the LGA. (Interestingly it was facilitated by Paul Wheeler, who facilitated the ‘do you want to be a councillor?’ training that I attended in late 2012 in a bit of a blur when my youngest Seffie was only weeks old.) My thoughts leading up to the weekend were mixed, as weekends are precious family time, but the training was absolutely brilliant, really high quality and so interesting and useful. I especially enjoyed a session from the Campaign Company about how to understand people’s values by segmenting them into ‘Settlers’, ‘Pioneers’ and ‘Prospectors’ which gave me a different lens to think about some of the values and interests of Forest Gate residents which I’d be happy to discuss with any member who is interested. We had an entire day on public speaking on the Sunday with an amazing woman who is a trained actor and whom I would heartily recommend.

I’ve also been helping Seyi out with her drive as CLP Women’s Officer to encourage more women to stand for election in 2018. I feel especially passionate about this, as when I stood for selection in 2013 my children were 4, 2 and 10 months old, and I was entirely intimidated by the process, nonplussed by how I would combine my caring responsibilities with anything else, and worried about whether I should stand. This is Seyi’s project and she’s doing all the work, but it’s been a pleasure to try to lend her a hand: bouncing together ideas for her great ’10 things to do’ list for women considering standing (https://forestgatenorth.com/2017/01/31/2018-council-election-training-for-labour-women/ ), and giving feedback and help with the format of the training.

I am always happy to speak to anyone who is thinking about standing to be a councillor, either in 2018 or in the future. If you’d like to contact me, please just drop me a line. I’m happy to keep your interest quiet if you’re feeling cautious and worried about appearing big-headed (I was!). I’m happy to talk no matter where you are – whether you’re determined to stand or whether you’re not even sure whether you might possibly be interested or not. My contact details are at the bottom of this, or on the councillors’ blog. And if you want more information about what it’s like being a councillor and what’s involved, Seyi’s and my blog www.forestgatenorth.com is a great place to start.

Equalities

Although this report focusses on my ward responsibilities rather than my Mayoral advisor role, I wanted to briefly mention an event I attended, ‘Rainbow London’ at the end of January which was a thought-provoking introduction to some of the LGBT voluntary organisations across London, and particularly those working intersectionally. There was a beautifully done exhibition ‘Twilight People’ about the stories of trans people of faith that I am arranging to come to Newham and am hoping will be in the Gate Library. If and when it arrives I’ll publicise it as it’s well worth a look.

Reshuffle

Last week the Mayor announced a reshuffle of responsibilities for his Mayoral Advisors. As Cabinet member I am now responsible for Council Services to Small Businesses, Transformation, and Equalities. I have two priorities in these two new areas: firstly to meet with all the key councillors and officers, get up to speed, and do my best to fill David Christie’s shoes who last did this role. I then want to also work on how we communicate and involve people in these two areas of work, to other councillors, to Labour members, and to residents more widely. ‘Council services to small businesses’ rather confusingly, is not about the services that we offer to local entrepreneurs, but is instead the means by which Council services are ‘spun out’ into small, employee-owned, businesses that can provide Council services but also gain business from elsewhere. Transformation is the overarching way we’re changing the Council’s processes to make them better for residents. I’m right at the beginning of learning more about both these areas, but as always happy to chat about them with anyone who is interested. Email me and let’s have coffee.

Ward newsletter

Obviously not everyone is on social media, or reads our blog, and so we are putting together a ward newsletter, a short overview of some of our achievements and local work, and will be asking members if they can help deliver it, any assistance will be very much appreciated.

And finally

Thank you if you have made it through the whole of this report! It’s difficult to decide how much detail to include, and I’m aware everyone’s time (and interest, let’s be honest) is limited. I always finish by saying this is just some of the work I’m doing, but that it’s rarely just me, and is a combination of colleagues and officers.  If you have any thoughts or ideas or questions I’d love to hear from you. The best way to contact me is by email but all my details are below.

Rachel

Rachel.tripp@newham.gov.uk
020 32897808
@rectripp
www.forestgatenorth.com

Rachel writes…

The last few years have been something of a rollercoaster introduction to planning for me, which I’ve alluded to before when I’ve written in my ward reports about the work of the Strategic Development Committee. As well as gaining insight into a whole area of architectural language that I’d previously never heard of (architectural rhythm, anyone? London vernacular? Animated streetscapes?) it’s also helped me to see the ways in which residents can interact with the planning process. Being part of the committee that decides larger scale developments,  we all see presentations from developers, as well as submissions from local councillors and from local residents, who often attend in order to object to proposals.

I often reflect after these meetings that once an application has come in, that responding to an application is  sometimes not the most useful time or way for people to express their views. And I’m often distracted, as are my colleagues, by thinking about how we might get residents to contribute earlier on, to the planning policy that shapes individual decisions, and in effect forms the criteria by which approvals or refusals are granted.

Which is why I wanted to blog today about the Local Plan consultation. You can find all the information about the consultation here on the Newham website. There is also an article in the most recent Newham Mag, on page 29, entitled ‘Help shape your borough’s future’. This is just one part of an enormous consultation process to overhaul the documents and policies, and you can read about the whole process, including where this consultation fits in, online.

The Local Plan is the overarching document that sets out our approach to planning and development, and this consultation is an opportunity to make sure that it’s up to date. The consultation is a bit enormous, so I thought I’d highlight a few bits that you might be interested in.

Issues and options, Part 1: policies This is a bit of a beast of a document but has lots of really interesting information about our overall approach. I especially like the ‘you told us…’ ‘we already…’ ‘we are concerned that…’ approach which summarises responses given so far. It deals with some of the big ‘meaty’ issues like homes, and supporting businesses.

Issues and options, Part 2: Sites refers specifically to sites across Newham, including some in Forest Gate, so I’d recommend that you take a look at these. You can see the sites that are in Forest Gate in the contents list right at the beginning.

The consultation runs from Friday the 24th February until midnight on Friday the 7th May, and submissions should be made by email.

Newham Living Streets

Walking / Air quality / Health / Cycling / Safer streets

Living Streets is a UK wide organisation that campaigns for walking and pedestrians. Do you want to help create streets that encourage people to walk? Are you interested in creating a local branch?

Join us at our first meeting.

8th March, 6.30pm – 8pm, The Gate library

You could be involved with campaigning, running the branch, or just lending your support and presence.

All welcome. Any questions, or queries, please email newhamlivingstreets@gmail.com

Rachel writes…

Last week was our monthly Forest Gate Community Neighbourhood meeting where councillors from Forest Gate North and South get together with local officers to plan what we will do locally, and learn more together about how the Council services work.

As well as doing some planning for this coming financial year’s work, we also heard an update from an officer in the Enforcement department about some work going on locally, which Seyi and I wanted to share with you. I’ll write some quick bullet points below but if you have more questions please do tweet me, or leave a comment (or indeed contact me however you prefer!) and I’ll be happy to find out more.

The fly tipping task force is in place, and is being expanded to take action on the issues of fly tipping that blight our lovely area. One example we were given of how enforcement can be combined with education was that a Fixed Penalty Notice (FPN) was issued after a mattress was fly tipped in Leonard Road, but this was combined with a leaflet drop to local houses, reminding them how to dispose of household rubbish. We still have a lot to do here  (I remember vividly the conversation I had one night with a man who was attempting to leave several bags of rubbish on a street corner, who assured me, “This is where it gets picked up! It’s a Newham thing!” and looked at me in mild confusion when I assured him, equally confidently, that he was in fact fly tipping and if he left the bags there I would report him….) but the ongoing work by the visiting team, combined with enforcement action, should have a real impact.

The team are continuing to monitor alleyways, including a particularly problematic one opposite Forest Gate station, which is often full of litter and refuse. This is a difficult issue as the alleyway is privately owned, and is also the only access point to several flats that are behind the shops. However, the officers are in touch with the owner, and have served a notice requiring him to clear the area, and I’m expecting further updates from officers.

Last year a new legal power came in that allowed local authorities to issue £400 fixed penalty notices to fly tippers. Since then, we have issued 165 of these, and I am assured we’ll continue to use these new powers robustly.

We also heard how local enforcement officers have been cracking down on the misuse of disabled badges in cars, especially on Woodgrange Road. Offending vehicles have in some cases (where the badge is stolen for example) been towed away.

In an example of some local detective work, after Ian from the library spotted some people fly posting on Woodgrange Road, he made a call to enforcement who used CCTV footage to catch the two people who were doing it, to fine them, and to seize over 1000 posters from them. Obviously each of these posters were going to be stuck up that day, so the preventative impact of seizing these was huge.  They were posters for the funfair in Queen Elizabeth Park, whom I have also been in touch with via twitter (nothing like a bit of publicity to help focus people’s minds!) to let them know that the people they rent their space to are defacing our high street. They replied very quickly to say they specifically don’t allow this, and will follow it up.

We also discussed a topic that has been getting some attention on social media at the moment: the stickers advertising prostitution that are all over our street furniture, the pilasters between shops, and lamp posts. Newham is currently spending around £70k per year removing these. However, the stickers are just the tip of the iceberg, as the real issue is the sex trade that they are promoting. Newham is working with the police to close the brothels that are the source of the problem, and we also run an exiting sex work service that offers the women a chance to find a different life. In addition to the work done just peeling off the stickers, police are at work calling the numbers, following up the issue. On a slightly more trivial but still important note, I also noticed that where stickers had been scraped off by council workers, the bits of paper and detritus had been left on the floor around lamp posts, which may well be collected by street cleaners later on, but in the meantime just adds to the litter around us, and also contributes to more litter. We are also testing the use of special paint, or lamp columns, which deters people from sticking on those address labels, because they don’t adhere properly and just peel off. I will update as soon as I have more information on this.

On that note, in Forest Gate we are planning a ‘fly posting fight back’ soon where we hope to take down illegally displayed material, and perhaps to distribute some scrapers that might help community minded people to carry on removing material. I have heard tell of a community initiative where people removed stickers and posters in one area so quickly that in the end people stopped putting them up… but I need to learn more about this!

After Seyi and my intensive work on the marketplace on Sebert Road (which you can read about here and here) where we learnt more about how commercial waste contributes to fly tipping, I was really interested and pleased to learn about some additional work being done  on this issue around the borough.  The enforcement team have visited every business on a primary route, which is to say every business that is on a timed waste collection. They have checked that they have a waste agreement in place, checked it’s up to date, and checked that it’s sufficient for their needs. As soon as I heard, I really wanted to share this huge piece of work, which is so important for helping to reduce fly tipping at its source. Whilst many local businesses are of course responsible and engaged, it’s still the case that one of the main sources of fly tipping around shops is businesses that don’t have a trade waste agreement (and just put their waste outside at night), businesses who leave their commercial bins open so other people fly tip there, or businesses who have an agreement but produce more waste than they pay for. I hope that this kind of prevention work will have a real effect.

This is just a quick overview of some of the work that enforcement are doing. In addition to all this, our ward has its own enforcement officer, Rikki, with whom Seyi and I are in regular contact. He walks the ward for at least 5-6 hours per day, and does valuable work in helping to make Forest Gate North a better place to live.

Seyi shares…

London Borough of Newham

The Newham (Waiting and Loading Restriction) (Amendment No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Forest Gate North) (Free Parking Places) (No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Forest Gate North) (Loading Bays) (No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Forest Gate North) (Parking Places) (No. 1, 2016) (Amendment

No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Forest Gate) (Free Parking Places) (No. 1, 2014) (Amendment

No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Forest Gate) (Loading Bays) (No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Forest Gate) (Parking Places) (Special Parking Area) (No. 1, 2002)

(Amendment No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Disabled Persons) (Community Parking) (Special Parking Area)

(No. 1, 2007) Amendment No. *) Order 201*

The Newham (Prohibition of Stopping on Taxi Ranks) (No. *) Order 201*

FOREST GATE CROSSRAIL STATION – COMPLEMENTARY PARKING AND

WAITING & LOADING MEASURES

1. NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the Council of the London Borough of

Newham proposes to make the above mentioned Orders under Sections 6, 45,

46, 49, 51 and 124 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, as amended.

2. The general effect of the Orders would be to:

(a) introduce a loading bay that would operate ‘at any time’ in Forest Lane,

outside Nos. 171 to 175;

(b) introduce a dual-use loading bay/30 minute maximum stay (no return

within 1 hour) pay by phone parking place in Sebert Road outside Nos.

12 to 16 (this would operate as a loading bay between 6am and 10am

and between 4pm and 7pm every day and as a parking place between

10am and 4pm every day with a charge of one pound for 30 minutes);

(c) introduce dual-use loading bays/30 minute maximum stay (no return

within 1 hour) pay by phone parking places in Woodgrange Road

outside Nos. 60 and 62 and outside Nos. 53 and 55 (these would

operate as loading bays between 6am and 10am every day and as

parking places between 10am and 7pm every day with a charge of one

pound for 30 minutes);

(d) introduce a taxi rank in Woodgrange Road, opposite Nos. 60 to 66,

where all vehicles except taxis would be prohibited from stopping ‘at

any time’;

(e) introduce free 5 minute maximum stay (no return within 1 hour) parking

places that would operate between 6am and midnight every day in:

(I) Woodgrange Road, outside No. 180 Forest Lane, outside Nos.

57 and 59 and outside Nos. 62 and 64; and

(II) Sebert Road, outside Nos. 16 and 18;

(f) remove an advisory disabled persons’ parking place in Woodgrange

Road outside Nos. 45/45a and introduce a 2 hour maximum stay (no

return within 2 hours) community disabled persons' parking place

outside Nos. 41/43 that would operate between 6am and 7.30pm every

day and be restricted to use by blue badge holders only;

(g) shorten 2 hour maximum stay paid for parking places in:

(I) Woodgrange Road outside Nos. 41 to 45 and opposite No. 45;

and

(II) Earlham Grove, adjacent to No. 49a Woodgrange Road; and

(h) replace existing waiting and loading restrictions with:

(I) waiting restrictions operating between 7am and 7pm on

Mondays to Saturdays (single yellow lines) and loading

restrictions operating between 7am and 10am on Mondays to

Fridays (single kerb blips) in Woodgrange Road outside Nos. 82

to 96 Woodgrange Road;

(II) waiting restrictions operating between 7am and 7pm on

Mondays to Saturdays (single yellow lines) and loading

restrictions operating between 4pm and 7pm on Mondays to

Fridays (single kerb blips) in Woodgrange Road outside Nos. 95

to 117 Woodgrange Road; and

(III) waiting and loading restrictions operating ‘at any time’ (double

yellow lines and double kerb blips) in the lengths of roads

referred to in the Schedule to this Notice (excluding those

locations in which the parking places or loading bays referred to

in paragraphs 2(a) to 2(g) above or the waiting and loading

restrictions referred to in sub-paragraphs 2(h) (I) or 2(h) (II)

above would be provided).

3. Copies of the proposed Orders, together with documents giving more detailed

particulars of the Orders, can be inspected from 9am to 5pm on Monday to

Friday at Newham Dockside, 1000 Dockside Road E16 2QU, until six weeks

after the date on which the Orders are made or until the proposed Orders are

withdrawn, as appropriate.

4. Further information can be obtained by telephoning 020 3373 2095.

5. All objections and other representations relating to any of the proposed Orders

must be made in writing by 8 March 2017.  All objections must specify the

grounds on which they are made.  They should be sent to the Head of

Commissioning (Highways and Traffic), London Borough of Newham, 3 rd Floor

West, Newham Dockside, 1000 Dockside Road, London E16 2QU or by email

to: traffic.orders@newham.gov.uk

6. Anyone objecting to any of the proposed Orders should be aware that in view

of the Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985 this Council may be

obliged to make any comments in respect of this Notice open to public

inspection.

Dated 15 February 2017.

JOHN BIDEN

Head of Commissioning (Highways and Traffic)

SCHEDULE

Proposed waiting and loading restrictions operating ‘at any time’ at the

following locations (excluding certain lengths – see paragraph 2(h) (III)):

 Brooking Road, the south-east side, adjacent to its junction with Woodgrange

Road;

 Earlham Grove, both sides, adjacent to its junction with Woodgrange Road;

 Forest Lane, both sides, from Woodgrange Road to the west of Kuhn Way;

 Hampton Road, both sides, adjacent to its junction with Woodgrange Road;

 Kuhn Way, both sides, adjacent to its junction with Forest Lane;

 Osborne Road, both sides, adjacent to its junction with Woodgrange Road;

 Sebert Road, both sides, adjacent to its junction with Woodgrange Road and, on

the south side, waiting restrictions extending to outside No. 20 Sebert Road and

loading restrictions to outside No. 10 Sebert Road;

 Woodgrange Road, both sides, from Brooking Road to outside No. 45

Woodgrange Road.

Seyi shares…

As you may already be aware, Newham Council has secured £2.298m from Transport for London to improve the space outside Forest Gate Station, including Woodgrange Market Place.

We consulted on our overall proposals in September 2015, and we are now preparing our detailed landscape proposals. These include information on tree planting locations, new seating, pavement materials and cycle facilities.

More information can be found on the display board here. The display board will also be available at The Gate Library and CoffeE7 (10 Sebert Road, E7 0NQ) until Thursday 16 February.

You can provide comments by emailing us at CrossrailFG@newham.gov.uk  or by completing a comments sheet, which will be available at The Gate Library and at CoffeE7 (10 Sebert Road, E7 0NQ). Please provide comments by Thursday 16 February.

Kind regards,

Crossrail Public Realm Team

Rachel writes…

I have been wanting to write a post for ages called ‘report it’, and was prompted to start it today when I was going back through casework.

Sadly, other councillors and I spend a lot of time talking to residents about problems they are experiencing, from pot holes, to loud noise, to fly tipping. I forward this information on to officers, who will whenever they can follow it up and deal with it. More and more, though, I find myself saying to people ‘please report it’ and so I wanted to write a bit more about why.

I have a few ongoing cases at the moment, which are at very different stages. One of them concerned ongoing noise, litter and ASB, and seems (fingers tightly crossed) to have been stopped. One of them concerns noise and disruption, and I am cautiously optimistic that it will be stopped soon. One of them concerns noise and disruption and I’m currently not that optimistic.

And what’s the difference between these cases? Reporting. In the first case, the neighbours all got together and decided that they weren’t having it. They contacted their councillors, they contacted the police, they even formed a little local whatsapp group to share information. They ensured each and every time they were disturbed, that they reported. Result? The police and the Council both had information that showed a repeated disturbance, over a period of time. It was taken seriously, and the police showed up, and now the problems of noise and litter aren’t happening in a place that was showing all the signs of becoming a trouble spot. (Of course there are a number of caveats here. One is that an ‘enforcement only’ approach can often just move the problem around rather than solving it, and that may well be what’s happened here. But prevention is a bigger issue than I can deal with here! I will come back to it. For the moment, rest assured that I know things are complex, and am not complacent.)

In the second case, I heard from a resident about persistent noise and disturbance from a local building. My heart sank a little, until I found that the Noise and Nuisance team at the Council had such an ongoing record of complaints and problems that they were already pursuing it. I therefore contacted them to add my concerns, advised the resident to speak to neighbours, and he has got together a petition as well. All the information will be looked at soon by the Licensing Committee, who are considering whether this venue should continue to have an alcohol licence or whether their licence should be changed. Seyi and I both formally sent in a joint objection to how things currently are (she’d had casework from around this venue too), and one of us will try to attend the hearing to make our residents’ case.

In the third case, similarly there is a problem with ongoing noise and fumes and disturbance which has been disrupting the lives of residents for some considerable time. However, without going into the specifics of this particular case, the residents have been collecting information about it, but due to the involvement of an external organisation who are the landlord (and with whom I’m extremely frustrated), there isn’t the ongoing record that we need at the Council in order to be able to take action. I’m therefore going back to the residents now, who are understandably dis-spirited, to encourage them, as I am encouraging you now, to report, starting from now, so that we can collect evidence from this point onwards.

I know that reporting can feel annoying. I also know it can feel pointless, especially if you are reporting the same thing. Reporting fly tipping at the same spot, again and again, feels like throwing information into the abyss…. but the more reports the Council receives the more we can make the case that the data shows this is a ‘hotspot’ and deserving of special attention by the local ward enforcement officer and / or the fly tipping team. Reporting noise again and again feels like it achieves nothing, but the Council has legal powers to take action against people and businesses who are causing an ongoing nuisance … but to do that we need ongoing information. Reporting that your street hasn’t been swept is frustrating, but if you contact us to tell us your street is regularly unswept, and when the officer assures us it always is, we can refer them to a series of Love Newham reports where, every two weeks, it is reported as unswept, we can be much firmer about requiring a solution!

I was also very struck once by meeting a resident who had lots of ideas for the improvement of her street and area, and also a list of problems that she wanted resolved. She reported regular ASB and noise and trouble, and also small scale flooding. When I asked (tentatively) if she reported it, she told me confidently, “They know.”

“They know.” Honesty, I felt a bit despairing. I wanted to say, “Um, *I* didn’t know!”

Of course, I am not denying that reports get lost, and I am sure this resident was in touch with all the right people a long time ago, and nothing happened, and she now feels ignored. But it’s very hard to know what we can do now, when Seyi and I go back to Enforcement and to the police, who tell us that this particular area isn’t a trouble spot, as far as they’re concerned, because they have received no complaints.

At risk of talking myself round in circles, I can’t round off this paean to reporting without acknowledging that there are structural issues with reporting, which I’m always aware of. I know some people aren’t able to report, or are unwilling to, or find it more difficult, or are frightened of the consequences, and that issues of socioeconomic background, race, disability, gender, and deprivation will always mean that some voices are heard more loudly than others. And I remind myself (and Seyi reminds me) that the loud voices aren’t always the neediest ones. As councillors we are always looking for and thinking about ways that we can help to amplify voices that won’t be heard otherwise. I also think there are things we could do structurally to ‘close the loop’, so that people who send in information can hear about what happens as a result, and be motivated to continue to do so.

But if you’re reading this, and if you have easy internet access, and a phone, please do keep reporting, and don’t be disspirited. Please help us to direct the Council’s resources to the places where they are needed, help us to have accurate information about how things are, and we can make a difference.

————————————-

Report it – useful contacts

Love Newham
This is the single best and easiest way to report a huge variety of different things to the Council. There are a number of categories including fly tipping, but also dog fouling, graffiti, problems with the road or kerb, broken road signs, and much more.

Use the Love Newham app which you can download to your phone.

Reporting online
There is a ‘report it’ page on the Newham Council website, with a big long list of different things that you can report. This includes I think all of the categories on Love Newham, but also noise, possible breaches of planning, and unlicensed rented properties.

Regarding reporting ongoing noise, the team says:
‘Before you complain about noise, please take these steps.

– Try to solve the problem in a friendly way by talking to the person or company causing the noise if you feel comfortable with this.
– If this does not work, you could try taking other informal steps such as mediation – for more information go to the Problem Neighbours website.
– If you still can’t solve the problem, complain to us.’

If the noise is happening right now, you can report it to Newham 24 hours a day on 020 8430 2000. You may need to leave a message, and a member of the team will endeavour to call you back within an hour, depending on the volume of calls they are receiving.

——————

I really hope that this information is useful, and that the reports you make are acted on. As ever, if they’re not please contact one of us and we’ll chase it up for you.