Society News (including Transport & Planning)

Transport

Since the last newsletter, there have been traffic management improvements to Honor Oak Park and Honor Oak Road. We are pleased that Lewisham Council has done something to improve the quality of life for residents on these busy roads but we are concerned that the speed bumps (or pimples!) do not seem to be big enough to slow down the HGVs. We will be investigating the possibility of getting a Speed Sign, which tells drivers when they are going too fast.

Our lobbying of Esso, TfL and Lewisham Borough Environmental services has
stopped the leaking water at the Esso Petrol/Tesco Food store on the junction of Honor Oak Road and London Road. But we will continue monitoring the area to ensure that the water leak does not reappear.

In Parliament

The Forest Hill Society has lobbied hard to alert people to the threatened reduction in our London Bridge train service. So we were delighted on 9th March when our local MP, Jim Dowd, raised the issue in Parliament. He asked the Transport Minister for reassurance that the benefit of the East London Line Extension would not be diluted by cuts to other services.

Gillian Merron, the Transport Minister, replied that no final decision about timetabling had been made and hoped that this would “reassure” Jim Dowd’s constituents. It does not! Her whole reply seemed to suggest that a reduction in the train service to London Bridge was a given.

We’re maintaining our campaign on this important issue. The Forest Hill Society and other local community groups were congratulated in Parliament for putting so much work into analysing the implications of the ELL project. So the campaign is definitely having an impact in the right places.

Planning

The Society is currently reviewing a proposal for the redevelopment of Pizza Hut and the Red Cross shop on Dartmouth Road. The plan is to refurbish the shop units and to add flats above.

There’s also an application to convert part of Blockbusters on London Road into a William Hill betting shop. Unfortunately, our options are limited here since this is more a matter of licensing than planning. However, we are actively looking into this because we know it concerns many people.

We’re also looking at the bigger picture. How do we want to see Forest Hill develop in coming years? With this in mind, we're going to be undertaking a “Living Streets” assessment, which looks at the quality of the streets that we live on and what can be done to improve them. “Living Streets” used to be the Pedestrians Association and describes itself as the “champion of streets and public spaces for people on foot.”

The Society is always available to review planning applications and to support residents where development is proposed. Our email address is foresthillplanning@gmail.com