Mayor Slammed for "No Progress" in Hammersmith Broadway Safer
Murad Qureshi accuses Boris Johnson of taking "snail-pace" approach
Labour London Assembly Member Murad Qureshi AM has accused Mayor Boris Johnson of failing to act on his promised Better Junctions programme.
In February this year, the Mayor and Transport for London announced that Hammersmith gyratory was among 33 of London’s biggest and nastiest road junctions set to be transformed in a £300 million programme to make them safer and less threatening for cyclists and pedestrians.
At the time, Boris Johnson said: " These road junctions are relics of the Sixties which blight and menace whole neighbourhoods. Like so much from that era, they’re also atrociously-designed and wasteful of space. Because of that, we can turn these junctions into more civilised places for cyclists and pedestrians, while at the same time maintaining their traffic function."
The announcement promised details would be released in March with work to begin in the second half of the year.
But now he is being accused of being evasive when questioned by Mr Qureshi's colleague Val Shawcross. His response when she asked last month when he expected the work on each of the 33 dangerous junctions to be completed was that this information would be released "within the coming months".
Mr Qureshi says: " The Mayor’s recent evasive response has prompted fears that the programme could be scaled back further.
" London’s cyclists and road users will be deeply concerned that more than two years on from the Mayor promising to review these danger hot points very little seems to have been done.
" Despite originally promising to review the 500 most dangerous junctions the Mayor has scaled this back to only 33, and now he can’t, or won't, even say what, if any, progress has been made on those including the infamous Hammersmith Broadway gyratory in Hammersmith & Fulham.
" It is staggering that Boris Johnson has adopted such a secretive, snail-pace approach to this problem; especially given the number of cyclists killed and injured which prompted this review. As we head into winter and road conditions become more dangerous for cyclists people will want to know what is taking the Mayor so long."
October 31, 2014
