PARKING & SERVICING - HAVE YOUR SAY
The Council are consulting on their plans to relocate parking from the Twickenham Riverside Development site to surrounding areas and to re-designate some of the existing parking bays. They’re also consulting on servicing and access around the site.
Firstly, it’s great news that the riverfront of the new development will be pedestrianised. This will open up a fantastic space for people, not cars, including a town square, and a beautiful park area (a new improved DJGardens) surrounded by sympathetic buildings. The riverside cycle route will remain. #ParkNotCarPark
Here’s a video of the scheme and related concepts from Hopkins Architects, the Council’s chosen team of architects:
Rethinking Twickenham Riverside
PARKING
82 parking spaces will be relocated from the development site to elsewhere in Zone D, parking bays in the vicinity of the site will be re-desginated to prioritise hyper-local residents and businesses, and new parking spaces will be provided mostly for visitors.
We fully support the relocation of parking from the riverside site (that’s what we’ve campaigned for for nearly 3 years now), and the re-designation of nearby parking bays.
However, we feel that Council have missed some great opportunities to provide parking for visitors (and non-Zone D residents).
1. The Civic Centre, which has 25 spaces, should be available for parking all weekend on a pay & display basis
2. The farmers market should be relocated from Holly Road to the riverside square (a much nicer environment with greater footfall), thus freeing up approx 40 spaces from the Holly road car park on Saturdays.
3. An alternative to parking near to the riverside site and to keep traffic away from the town centre is to set up a Park and Ride service (from the RFU or Rosebine car parks possibly).
SERVICING AND ACCESS
ACCESS
Again, we fully support the Council’s plan to pedestrianise the riverfront. Obviously, the relocation of 82 parking spaces will greatly reduce the amount of motor traffic around the site. To enable vehicles to exit the Embankment the Council propose that they travel part way up Water Lane, turn left into the narrow service road, then turn right into Wharf Lane where they will exit. This is all rather convoluted, but it will work…until a truck parks in the service road to service the King Street stores, and then they’re stuck!
We believe there is a much simpler, more direct and more effective solution, which is to make Water Lane fully two-way. This will leave the service road clear for service vehicles. Making Water Lane a shared surface with a 10mph limit and pedestrian priority will ensure it is safe for people to cross.
The way in which this would work is detailed in our Traffic and Servicing Report, which we published alongside our concept proposal, and have sent to the Council leader and the Design Panel.
SERVICING
We like Hopkins and the Council’s plans for EPI Servicing, which involve moving the loading bays to the other (East) side of the bridge, and moving the ice cream van’s space to allow room for vehicles to turn. But, we think Mr Whippy would be better off on the higher and drier side of the road where it’d be easier to provide an electric outlet (no more Mr Whiffy!).
We were shocked to see that the Council are proposing a New Loading Bay in King Street on the corner of Water Lane. However, no detail or rationale is provided, but we heard today from a senior councillor that this is for Church Street delivery vehicles that don’t arrive when they should (ie when the road is temporarily closed)! This is just plain wrong for a number of reasons:
- the clear feedback from the Architects’ Design consultation was that residents wanted this corner to be more open and inviting to attract people to the riverside. Big trucks will not improve the permeability of this corner or be very appealing!
- removing a large section of pavement to compensate for badly timed deliveries is far from best practice.
- the service road should be used for this purpose (if it’s necessary at all).
PLEASE - HAVE YOUR SAY
Here’s the Council's Twickenham Riverside Development page.
And here’s a more direct link to the ‘Survey’. This includes 3 layout plans with different levels of detail. Residents in Zone D have received this information by post, but the consultation is open to all LBRUT residents (full address details are required).
Parking & Servicing Consultation
As always, we welcome your feedback either by commenting on this post, via email @twickriversidepark@gmail.com or on twitter @TwRiversidePark
#ParkNotCarPark