Forest Gate North – Rachel Tripp's councillor blog

Rachel writes…

In the summer I was contacted by Eastside Community Heritage, to ask if I’d be interested in taking part in a project they were running about the oral history and leisure activities of people in Forest Gate. Those who have met me in person will attest to my being a chatterbox, so it was with alacrity that I accepted and spent a very happy hour or so being interviewed about my leisure time and experience in Forest Gate (we spent some time discussing campaigning and political activity, which I’d never thought of as exactly ‘leisure’ before, but there you go…)

They are still looking for people to participate, and I thought I’d give them a quick plug here. Please do contact them and volunteer your experiences, and be part of a wonderful project to preserve our history in a way that is entirely non-onerous.

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‘Folk of Forest Gate’ is Eastside Community Heritage’s ongoing project to chart the history of leisure in Forest Gate by collecting the memories and stories of local people. By seeing how leisure activities have changed, we can get an idea of the different communities that have moved through Newham in the last 70 years. We’ve already had some fun and fascinating interviews, but we are keen to speak to more residents or ex-residents to get as many perspectives as possible. Whether you have lived in the area for a long time or a short time, whether you moved away or if you’ve only recently moved in, we’d love to hear your first impressions and lasting memories! To get involved please contact francis@ech.org.uk or call 0208 5533116.

Hackney band, Sounds like Six, playing in a competition at the Forest Gate Uppercut Club, 1967. The club hosted many of the biggest bands of the 60’s but was only open from 1966-1967. Before then it had been a popular skating rink. It later re-opened to host punk and reggae gigs.

“I didn’t hang around much in Forest Gate, though I did in one coffee bar in Plashet Road. I used to like going in there because they had live music, which was skiffle. So I enjoyed that. You know, the drums, and the guitars and things. And it was very amateur. You knew that when you were listening to it. And the way they played it, it was very amateur… They’d play live in all the coffee bars and the theatres and everything. Skiffle more or less took over the theatres. Instead of variety shows, it’d be skiffle shows, you know?” – Keith

Green Street residents partying in their home

“I remember one, one day I was playing at home or colouring, and I had all this green ink on my hands from the pens that I was using. And my mum said, during the afternoon, that, ‘We’re going to go to the cinema’… And I couldn’t wash the green ink of my hands. And I was really worried because I thought, ‘When I get to the cinema…’… I think we were going to the Queen’s that time. They used to have commissionaires outside. A person used to stand there in a uniform to guide the queues and to manage the queues. And I thought, ‘If he sees my hands being green he won’t let me in!’ I stood there with my hands clenched so tightly so he couldn’t see the green ink!” – Harold

Before television sets became cheaply available Forest Gate was home to many cinemas. This photo of the Odeon, taken in the 1980s, is after it closed as a cinema. It became a bingo hall and later a snooker club, and is now an Islamic cultural centre.

“I just remember a load of noise. I’m sure they were wooden wheels on the wooden floor. I think I was quite amazed that I came out and my bike was still there! I mean, if you wanted to go roller skating you’d go to Forest Gate or Alexandra palace. Everyone had skates. Everyone could skate… I think I actually used my skates in the end and made a box car. That was all the rage. You put a pair of skates on the back and big wheels on the front… Sounds a bit stupid really, but that’s when my skates landed up!” – Kevin

Rachel writes…

Introduction

I want to write a blog post here about the Olympic stadium, because I want residents in Forest Gate North to be able to have one place where they could read the facts, and to know how they are being represented, all laid out clearly in one place. 

Without wanting to sound worthy, I’m also writing this because it’s so important for public bodies and the people who work in them to be transparent. I am a cabinet member at Newham, and I take that seriously, but I am also one of your elected representatives in Forest Gate North, and I don’t feel I would be doing my job properly if I wasn’t always trying to be open, even when the topics are challenging and feelings run high.

Timeline

Last week (Thursday 7th September) there was a cabinet meeting at 5pm. That afternoon before the meeting, I read on social media that the £40m loan that the Council made to the Olympic stadium had been ‘written off’ and that this formed part of that cabinet report and was being decided that evening. 

I assumed that this must be in the agenda item Medium Term Financial Strategy, a report which is regularly updated and sent to Councillors.  This report gives a commentary and information about where the Council’s finances are.

But in fact the report that contains the reference to the stadium loan is not one that was on the agenda for that evening. It is in the Draft Statement of Accounts 2016-17, which is due to go to the next Investment and Accounts Committee later this month. The draft statement of accounts which contains the reference is here. 

The bit of this report that is particularly relevant is on page 12 which reads, ‘Impairment totalling £44.4m of a Long Term Debtor in one of the Council’s group undertaking, Newham Legacy Investments Ltd. These charges are subsequently written-off to the Capital Adjustment Account (Note 26)’

I was extremely concerned when I read this, as were many other residents. This was the first time I had seen this kind of assumption made about the Olympic stadium loan.

The Council’s statements

The Council has subsequently released a statement which I will reproduce in full here, saying:

“The council’s draft accounts for 2016/17 were first published on our website on 3 July and were then open to the normal period of public scrutiny until 11 August. These draft accounts are currently with our auditors for their review. The finalised accounts are due to be considered at a scheduled meeting of our Investment and Accounts Committee on 20 September.

“Our draft accounts, which are subject to change and approval, show a prudent, responsible and regulatory compliant treatment of a Council loan related to the London Stadium. The loan is shown, for accounting purposes, as currently ‘impaired’, or damaged, due to the current financial performance of the Stadium. It is not a write off of the loan.

“The financial performance of the Stadium in its first full year of transformed operation is a matter of public record and it was widely anticipated that the first full year of trading would be particularly challenging. Newham Council is working with the Greater London Authority, the London Legacy Development Corporation and our other Stadium partners on a range of options to improve the financial performance of the Stadium. The future value of our loan, and its treatment in our accounts, is directly linked to that future performance.”

 end of statement

 Other information given to journalists said:

 1. The £40m loan is a repayable one over 40 years.

2. The Mayor of London has commissioned an independent review into the London Stadium and that to inform this work, all partners in the stadium are looking at options to improve commercial performance.

3. There has been a successful summer programme in the stadium, including three major concerts and World Championship Athletics and Para Athletics.

4. Newham residents have enjoyed benefits as a result of the council’s investment in the form of ticket giveaways. This includes 5,000 free tickets to West Ham United’s Carrbao Cup game on 19 September against Bolton Wanderers. These tickets are being issued to residents through community neighbourhoods, community groups, a ticket ballot, and to volunteers and staff.

Other information

I have subsequently also been told that:

– impairment is an accounting term and is not a write-off. If a substantial loan were to be written off, it would come to Mayoral Proceedings, which is a public meeting with a paper. 

– there is a precedent for this, as during the financial crisis, loans made by Newham to Icelandic banks were ‘impaired’ by 100% but were subsequently revalued as the position changed, and were paid off. 

– there are commercial negotiations ongoing which are currently confidential, and more information will be released as soon as an agreement is reached.

What happens next

This information takes us up to now. So I also wanted to set out clearly here what I think should happen next.

Firstly, I’m surprised that this is the first we’ve heard that there was doubt about the value of the loan. Although I have heard various conversations about the profitability of the stadium, and ways in which this could be improved (the costs attached to moving the seating is a relatively well known barrier to making money, just for example), previously the information about the loan has been what a good deal the Council has.

To summarise my understanding of this, we borrowed the money at a relatively low rate of interest, and have loaned it to the Stadium who pay us a commercial (higher) rate of interest. This means that we get back: the original investment, the difference in the two interest rates, the community benefits (community days, free tickets for residents) and also 30% of the profits in perpetuity. Although this loan has been controversial, I have always been assured that the terms of the deal were beneficial to us.

Secondly, I mentioned transparency above, and I think transparency is even more important when the topic is controversial. The impression given here, rightly or wrongly, is that the information has been hidden, and I think this is a great shame. I’m surprised that there wasn’t more explanatory text in the accounts document, and am even more surprised that the term ‘written off’ was used without anyone realising that if the accounts use these words, then residents reading it may – not unreasonably! – not understand the financial term ‘impairment’ and assume that the loan has indeed been written off. So I think we need more public information (where it’s possible to publish it, and recognising that commercial negotiations do sometimes need to be confidential for reasons that are entirely right) so that financial decisions and changes to financial circumstances can be not just published, but explained and understood. 

Thirdly, I need to learn more about the loan, which increasingly appears not to be a loan at all but more akin to an equity share, despite having been consistently referred to as a loan. Apparently, the difference this makes includes the terms under which the interest is payable. Generally on a loan the interest is payable whatever happens. With our loan/equity share, I understand that interest payments are only made once the stadium is profitable.

Other considerations

For fairness, there are a few other things I need to point out which are points that have been made to me. 

The investment that Newham made in the stadium was key in ensuring that it would become a multi-use venue in its own right, and not fail after the Olympics. Having a venue like this in Newham, bringing sporting and musical and other events into Newham, is really important to the borough and very positive in terms of employment, place-making, sporting opportunities, visitors, and much more.

Although no one else has made this connection, I also keep remembering the O2, which started life as the entirely ill-fated Millennium Dome, referred to with seeming certainty as a white elephant, but now reimagined as a thriving music venue. Obviously I understand that the analogy is not perfect, but it does show what can be done.

Also, I think it’s worth re-emphasising that since I have become a councillor in 2014, the Newham budget has been cut by around 30%. It’s difficult to overstate what an enormous impact this level of cuts has had on local government across the UK, and the signs of it are everywhere, from libraries closing (not in Newham, thankfully) to the increase in street homelessness. Local authorities are making commercial decisions and in many cases are making capital investments in order to secure longer term income so that they can continue to provide services. 

The money invested in the stadium is capital investment not revenue, and was borrowed by LBN in order to invest. So while it’s still public money, and important to remind ourselves of the vulnerable people the Council has a duty to support, it’s not the case that, for example, ‘that £40m could have been spent on social care’. Also, the consultation that we held in the summer 2015 about makings savings was about cuts to our revenue, so this was absolutely not a consultation asking residents what they wanted to cut in order to fund the stadium. 

I’m also reminded that previous investments the Council has made have been successful. The building at Dockside, for example, has risen in value significantly, whereas at the time the purchase of it was also controversial with strong feelings expressed against it in some cases.

Summary and conclusion

Overall for me the things that need to happen now can be summed up into: the ‘what’, the ‘how’ and the ‘what now’ . The ‘what’ being the money – when do we find out more, was it a good investment, can we be assured that the money comes back, what further information do we need? The ‘how’ being how this information was and is communicated, and the ‘what now’ being, well – obviously –  what happens next.

The joint meeting of the Audit Committee and the Investment and Accounts committee (which approves the accounts)  is due to take place on the 27th September. The Council’s statement above refers to the 20th, but this date has since been changed. I’ll attend it, and report back here as to what is discussed. This is the next important date, but it is not within this committee’s gift to ‘decide to write off’ the loan. The impairment is an accounting term which should reflect current financial values and assumptions, and should be a neutral not a political decision. It will nevertheless be interesting to listen to the discussion of the accounts, and find out more.

Along with all my colleagues, I will do my very best to get all the information I can, and will share whatever I’m able to. I have spoken to the Mayor already, and will do so again, and am going to sit down with my colleague Lester Hudson who is the political lead for Finance to talk to him. I should point out that although this blog post is mine (and I’m responsible for any errors in it) I am certainly not the only council member who wants to find out more. Here in Forest Gate North, we have a blog, and many of our residents are on social media, so it makes sense for me to share this here. Other councillors are doing the same things, but off line and in different ways.  

As ever, I am happy to discuss any part of this, and will answer any questions that I’m able to. Please don’t hesitate to get in touch. I won’t release or leak confidential information but I will always be up front about what I am and am not able to share. 

I really hope this post is useful. 

Rachel writes…

A super quick blog post from me to share details of a funding pot that I received by email today. The Aviva Community fund gives the chances for community groups to apply for funding, from small grants up to £25,000, on a range of areas like health, skills, cohesion, and more.

The guide to how to apply is online here.

If you have an idea, or just the beginnings of an idea, then please do get in touch.  I’m happy to discuss it with you, to put you in touch with other people or groups who might be interested in working with you, to look over a completed application and give my input, or do anything else that might help.

Rachel writes…

For various reasons our usual ‘every-three-months’ ward report cycle to our Labour members has been delayed, so I thought I’d write a quick mini report and post it online before so much time elapses that everything I say is out of date. So this blog post is just to capture a short update on some of the main pieces of local work I’ve been doing lately.

Thorogood Gardens

I’ve blogged about this before, and I’m delighted to report that the work Seyi and I have been doing here has been yielding some great results. The road has now been resurfaced, and the lighting replaced, and old bollards removed. A previously scruffy green space has been transformed into a communal garden, and Seyi and I have worked with Hochtief, the contractors who are working on Maryland station, to get support from them for replacing fence panels in gardens that face onto the cul-de-sac, and money for planting flowers in the communal garden. I’m really delighted that Forest Gate Community Garden are doing this with us, bringing their expertise and enthusiasm to a space that has been a bit unloved. There will also be a  Council ‘Street Connections’ project held in Thorogood Gardens soon, bringing neighbours together to get to know each other through planting, and we’re even hoping to paint some play markings on the tarmac to encourage children to play on what is currently a large unused space. I wrote a community update leaflet for the residents, outlining what feedback they’d given us, what’s been done, and what’s been planned, and Seyi and I hand delivered these and spoke to residents about their feedback, and any further ideas. It feels like a lot has been achieved, which is really rewarding.

Forest Lane Park fun day

I attended this in August with my family, and was so thrilled to see such a great day put on by the staff who work at the Gate library. One of the reasons for holding this event was to, in Council parlance, ‘activate the park’, which is to say bring people to the park, encourage them to explore it, and hopefully thereafter to use it regularly. Forest Lane Park is an incredible gem, with a large green space, a pond, woodland trail, and an outdoor gym as well as the playground (which faces the road so is a little more well known). It does have some problems with some anti-social behaviour, but the more that people use it the less this will occur. Next steps here are to work with the Community Neighbourhood staff and Communications to get some better signage for the park – many people walk past it regularly and do not know it’s there! – and in the longer term to look at establishing a residents’ group or ‘Friends of Forest Lane Park’, starting with the people who live in Magpie Close.

Street cleansing

I’ve had some casework recently about inadequate street sweeping, and am following this up as fast and as firmly as I can. Which isn’t to say I’m slow or shy about casework generally, but that I know street cleansing is really important not just in terms of how our streets look, but how litter encourages more litter, how it affects how we all feel about the area, and how it contributes to everyone’s satisfaction with the Council as a whole. There have been some changes to how street sweeping is delivered – part of my Cabinet role is overseeing the ‘Small Business Programme’ where council services are spun out into smaller, co-operative style businesses in order to do things better, and to protect what we do from privatisation. It is pretty obvious, however, that our starting point has to be that services do in fact become better and not worse, so I’m questioning officers and will visit streets with them to ensure that what I’m told are teething problems are just that, and that we can all see improvements.

Gun crime

I am so saddened to write this part of my report, as I know many residents are too, as we read today that one of the teenage victims of the recent shooting in our ward has died in hospital. My heart goes out to his family at this terrible time. I know that the police have appealed for any information to help them make an arrest, and are working hard both for justice but also to reassure residents and to keep everyone safe. They have met with Council officers to discuss what happens next, which will I hope include some community reassurance work as well as some more combined work on preventing this kind of terrible occurrence. We’ll share more information as we have it.

Forest Gate Community School

I would love to claim credit for this, but I am just sharing it in the spirit of spreading good news – Forest Gate Community School had their best ever GCSE results in English and Maths. This is part of a huge success story in Newham with educational results at all levels rising year on year and in many cases exceeding significantly the national average despite the challenges our schools face. It’s so great to see FGCS thriving, building on their amazing Ofsted result, and going from strength to strength. Great schools for our young people is such an important part of our community, and I’m so grateful for all the work that the team at FGCS have done.

Cemetery Road

I received some feedback about footway parking, which in Forest Gate North is those parking bays on some narrow roads that are partly on the pavement and partly on the road. The resident complained that footway parking can block the pavement, can damage it, should be avoided wherever we can, and particularly objected where it had been introduced in Cemetery Road where he didn’t feel it was necessary… and I have to say I felt he had a point. So between us, Anam, Seyi and I (accompanied by some local Labour members) did some specific door knocking down Cemetery Road to ask residents whether we might remove one or more of the parking bays on the northern side of the road, which appeared to us on all our sessions to be largely empty. I wrote a leaflet for those residents who weren’t in, explaining that we were exploring removing some parking and asking for their views. Feedback from residents was cautiously positive, so the next step is to contact the Cemetery itself to discuss their parking needs, and then depending on how that goes, to contact parking design to ask them to remove a bay or two. Watch this space.

Forest Gate Pride

I was thrilled to help support Forest Gate Pride in July, a fabulous day filled with rainbows, diversity, celebration and love of all kinds. I provided some support to the organisers whilst they were preparing, including putting them in touch with Licensing, reassuring Licensing about the kind of family-friendly event they were planning, supporting their application for funding, and generally encouraging them whenever I could. I was especially pleased when I spoke at an LGBT breakfast to be able to tell Ruth Hunt from Stonewall, who was previously a Forest Gate resident, that we were holding our first pride and that all were welcome.

It was an honour, therefore, to be asked to open proceedings on the day, and I’m happy to report that I diligently followed through my commitment to the event by going out to the evening section of the event and sampling the entertainment (stunning) and the beverages (as ever, very nice) at the Forest Tavern that night.

Woodgrange Road Crossrail works

The Crossrail works have begun around the station, and I’ve been peering in a very geeky way past the pink barriers at the lovely new pavements we are getting. The quality of the materials, I am assured by officers, is really high quality, and the whole project, which you might remember includes planting and bike racks, and more, will make a huge difference to our town centre. There will be some disruption to put up with as it’s done, but if we can grit our teeth and get through that, it will definitely be worth it.

Keep Newham Moving

The Newham-wide Keep Newham Moving programme continues, with work completed on Leonard Road, on Essex Road and Suffolk Road, and now also on Odessa Road. Having received consistent feedback on the poor condition of Sebert Road, I’m delighted to say that this is also now underway, as is Chestnut Avenue, and I mentioned before the resurfacing of Thorogood Gardens. I am however sorry to add that the point I made in my last blog post about this still stands – I still do think there is more that we can do to maximise the impact of the money we are spending here, in terms of making other improvements too like pedestrianising, cycle infrastructure, traffic calming, planting and more. But this is a view that others share, so I am optimistic that with the help of colleagues we can make this happen as well.

Car-free around Godwin School

Along with Frances Clarke (a Forest Gate North resident who is also a councillor in East Ham, and whose remit includes health) I have been in touch with colleagues in highways and with Godwin school to look at making Cranmer Road car-free at school drop-off and pick-ups. Some of you might have read about similar schemes in other boroughs, aimed at encouraging families to walk to school, and to improve the air quality around schools. If we do this, it would be a pilot, to see how it could work, to look at the results, and to get feedback. Discussions are at an early stage, but I am very hopeful that this could be the beginning of more work that encourages other forms of transport as well as contributing to the Mayor of London’s healthy streets policy.

Greening

Always on the look-out for ways to make the ward greener, I recently agreed with officers a plan to introduce some additional planters in front of Emily Duncan House on Woodgrange Road. A resident had complained to me about cars parking on the pavement there which is particularly wide, and it seemed a good chance to create something positive to prevent this from happening. I am even more pleased that Forest Gate Community Garden have agreed to plant and maintain one of the planters there, and am really hoping that this could be the beginning of a number of planters that are adopted by local people and organisations.

I was also reminded via twitter about the ‘energy garden’ scheme that London Overground are doing on some of their stations. We had a meeting to look into doing this at Wanstead Park station, but this was delayed because of the work going on for the electrification of the line. Now that the work is (ok, largely) finished I’ll come back to this and see if it’s still possible, especially as both Forest Gate Arts and the community garden have said they are interested.

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As ever, it seems I have run away with myself, and what I intended to be a super short update has turned into something a bit longer. I will however, end by apologising that the various demands of the summer and my family life at the moment have prohibited me from sharing more fully. This isn’t everything I’ve been doing… but equally, almost none of this is work I’ve done on my own, it’s all in collaboration with my colleagues and officers.

I’m always happy to discuss the work we’re all doing to make the ward a better place. You can always contact me if you have any questions about work already being undertaken, or even better if you have an idea that you’d like to make happen.

Rachel writes…
I have been meaning to write this for a while, but was prompted to do so by the words of a resident in an email about Centre Road’s new double yellows, who said, ‘Small things like this can make a big impact on the community’.

Which is very true. And wise words for all of us who are struggling with wanting to right enormous and seemingly unstoppable wrongs – let’s start small. (And then let’s make BIG, big plans.)

Hence this belated blog post, to point out for those who haven’t noticed, and to celebrate with those who have: Redbridge have put double yellow lines down both sides of Centre Road!

If you haven’t been following this saga as closely as others then you can read why we were concerned on the blog here. In essence, after the RPZ was introduced in Forest Gate North, there appeared to be a large, and increasing, number of displaced cars and other vehicles parking all the way up Centre Road where previously there had been no parking.

Spurred on by complaints from residents, I was in touch with Redbridge, along with Seyi, at first gently then increasingly firmly, making the points that the vehicles parked were detrimental to everyone’s enjoyment of Wanstead Flats, were encouraging fly tipping along Centre Road, and most importantly were making the road extremely dangerous for all road users but especially for cyclists and for pedestrians.

It may or may not be a coincidence, but it was very soon after writing a very bald email stating my concern that we shouldn’t wait until someone had died to take action, that I was contacted to say that double yellow lines were going in as I had requested. There are often painfully few victories as a councillor, so I am claiming this one.

The picture above is one I took as we drove home from our holiday, south down Centre Road towards Forest Gate. A clear road, which is safer, and which has I believe already seen a drop in fly tips now that the area is not shielded by parked cars. A result.

Rachel writes…

Many Forest Gate residents use and value our local, independent shops and among those that we treasure is Barry’s Meat Market on Woodgrange Road. Barry Parsons has been Forest Gate’s local butcher for many years and even I, a pescatarian, have queued up for his turkey at Christmas, and bought sausages for my meat-eating children there.

Some of you will be aware that Barry’s and the shops along 39 – 49 Woodgrange Road have been given notice, as the whole row is being redeveloped into new retail units with flats above. The good news is that Barry has obtained new premises: the old Siam Café in fact, further up Woodgrange Road, and has submitted a planning application in order to turn this building into his new shop.

You can find the planning application here, and I’m writing this blog post to urge any interested local residents to log in and support the application. Barry has applied to fit out the shop downstairs as a butchers, with shop front, meat preparation space, and delivery area at the back. The application also proposes flats on top, which would raise the height of the building by one storey compared to the existing roofline.

I have just commented myself, and said:

‘I would like to register my strong support for this application. Barry’s butchers is a very valuable local business that is a vital part of our high street, and has been in Forest Gate for many years. Once the buildings at 39 – 49 Woodgrange Road are redeveloped, the businesses there will be displaced, and supporting this application offers a chance for one of those local businesses to re-establish itself in an alternative premises in the same high street.

I believe that refurbishing this property would be a high quality addition to our high street, and would reflect local desire for independent businesses. The addition of residential units above will help to support the business, and will add high quality accommodation to the high street.

Although the proposed plans are a storey higher than the buildings are currently, I support this as the additional height is stepped back from the front, only goes up to three storeys, is very close to nearby stations, and is in keeping with the higher buildings around it.

I hope very much that this application is supported so that a local building can be refurbished, the high street supported, more residential units created, and a local business encouraged to grow and thrive.’

In order to comment, you have to create an account and log in, and your comments are made public. If the application goes to the Local Development Committee, then I will endeavour to attend and to speak in support, but you don’t have to do that, you can just register your comments online and leave it there, safe in the knowledge that you’ve done your civic duty.

Edited to add: the closing date for comments is the 25th July.

Rachel writes…

Like many others, I had a ball at last year’s Jumble Trail: an ingenious event where you can register to have a stall in your front garden to sell your unwanted items, then use an online map to stroll around and pick up a bargain from your neighbours.

My abiding memories from last year are my girls playing out on the pavement between our neighbours’ houses, the fairy cakes I made selling faster than anything else, shifting a whole load of baby clothes to someone who obviously had exactly the same taste as me in children’s attire (bright colours, loud prints, pinafores, if you’re interested). And also my aspiration of clearing out loads of clutter being rather undermined by my eldest buying armfuls of plastic Polly Pocket playsets from down the road for pennies.

The good news is, it’s happening again! It’s on the 10th September and all details are on the flyer below. Register for a stall, or just put the date in your diary, and we can all turn out and enjoy the day all over again. With huge thanks to Elaine who organised last year’s, and to Kam who is stepping into her shoes this year.

Rachel writes…

Lots of residents have been commenting recently about the long line of cars parked up Centre Road. These cars and other vehicles have been creeping up the road, and appear to have been displaced when the Residents’ Parking Zone (affectionately known as an RPZ) was created in Forest Gate North.

I’ve responded to a few threads on Facebook and some messages on twitter, but I thought it would be handy to write a blog post and put all the relevant information we have right now here in one blog post for easy reading.

Centre Road is not in Newham, it’s part of the London Borough of Redbridge (although Wanstead Flats, which it runs through, is managed by the Corporation of London). The long line of cars appear to be a combination of business vehicles, some abandoned vehicles, and other cars where the provenance is entirely unclear. Wherever they are from, it’s clearly a problem, making it unsafe for pedestrians to cross the road, making it unsafe for cyclists to use the road, and providing a line of cover that seems to be masking some crime and ASB, meaning that there is now more fly tipping on Centre Road and a trail of broken glass where the unobserved cars are being broken into.

So what are we doing about it? Well, when the RPZ was being designed for Forest Gate North, officers at Newham informed both Redbridge and Waltham Forest, so that they could consider any action they needed to take as a result. I’ve been in regular touch with a councillor from the Redbridge side, and also with an officer there. Sadly I have to confess this hasn’t had much result yet – I asked for double yellow lines on both sides of the road, was told this idea would be fed into their ongoing plans, then I asked to be kept informed if any parking restrictions were planned. But I only found out that lines were going in on just one side when I drove past the work being undertaken!

My councillor contact from Redbridge, Cllr Paul Merry, has met with the cabinet member from Redbridge with responsibility for parking to ask what can be done here, and I’m currently expecting an update from him. I’ve also been in touch with the Corporation of London, because the line of parked vehicles is so detrimental to everyone’s enjoyment of the green spaces of Wanstead Flats, and have asked if they want to join us in asking Redbridge for some action. It’s pretty clear to me, and to many residents, that what we really need is double yellow lines on both sides of the road, as this is a road that was never designed for cars to be parked along it.

Seyi has also suggested we facilitate a joint meeting between concerned Forest Gate North residents, and representatives from Redbridge, which is a great idea. I worry a little that whilst some of the inaction we’ve experienced is due to the fact that planning parking restrictions takes time and needs careful planning (if you’re one of the residents who sent me petitions and emails asking for an RPZ then you’ll know it took a couple of years to get to a place where we could move forwards) that might not be the whole story. I know of course myself that all kinds of things councillors wanted to get done have been delayed by us all putting time and effort into the election… but I’m also perhaps cynically a bit concerned that Centre Road is not flanked by Redbridge residents, and might therefore not be very high on anyone’s priority list. So if we need noise to be made to Redbridge about the impact of the cars there, it’ll have to be us who make it.

So our next steps are:
– to chase up the Corporation of London to check if they are on board
– to find out the results of the meeting Cllr Merry had with his colleague responsible for parking
– Seyi and I arrange to meet with him or her to share our concerns, including a walk down Centre Road to look at the cars, lack of space for cycling, broken glass and fly tipping
– depending on how that goes, we organise a joint meeting for residents to put their views.

I’m sorry not to have anything more concrete for you, but as ever, we’ll keep you posted.