Chiswick Voices
Clare – June 2021
The old, sick disabled and those with pets and other needs like me can have a reasonable quality of life. My essential visit to the High Road today which I will now do max once per year was an absolute nightmare which I will do everything to avoid in future. Everything possible will now be delivered, plus will buy a car which will give me more choice re timing, routes etc of trips. Sick of being late to the vet and then charged waiting time when inevitably then have to wait because have to join back of queue to be seen because of these utterly stupid road changes, I am stressed, animals stressed, cab drivers stressed. And witnessed a teenage schoolchild nearly badly injured because of these incredibly stupid road changes this afternoon from a car turning left into Duke Road from the High Road. It is utter madness. Traffic piled up, someone reported their partner, a new Mum, had to risk an almost fine to get home to their new baby that needed feeding because of how long she was stuck in traffic. I saw two cyclists in my entire time on the High Road today while hundreds of motorists were stuck. The cycleway was flooded so those who braved it probably wanted to be a duck in another life. It is bonkers and needs someone with a semblance of common sense to put an end to this incredibly stupid and dangerous scheme.
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Rosie – March 2021: Yesterday, as with other days I nearly got knocked down by a cyclist who was going at breakneck speed by the bus stop next to the Police station. The traffic was at a standstill and I had to ‘rescue’ two people waiting at the old bus stop who were waiting in vain for a bus. The shelter is still there and so they believed that it as a bus stop. The traffic yesterday 8th May, was horrendous. Ambulances were having to go very slowly. The polite bus drivers waiting to let in on coming traffic themselves causes back up of the traffic. Large while lorries and vans loading and unloading further added to the problem. The replacement rail buses were largely empty, and, although it was a beautiful site watching a long time of stationary red buses it was no good for those, like me, that depend on public transport to move about. The pavement cyclists are still around, beaming with their ‘hands off approach’ and not listening to the reprimands of the law abiding cyclists. The person I rescued from the dead bus stop was in tears ‘ what have they done to Chiswick’ As a non driver, and a sometime cyclist I welcome schemes to make it easier and safer for cyclists to get around but this scheme is dangerous and is not a good advertisement for better designed ones. It seems as if the pedestrians have little say in such debates.
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Anecdotes from 2 women this morning, but how many of these anecdotes are real life experiences and add to the statistics? Friend from Kew has her cleaner coming from Ealing in the bus (only / best public transport available between the 2 places). She now arrives late in Kew due to traffic from Streetspace hence needs to leave that house later and arrives late in her 2nd job. She then needs to cut that job short (and earn less money) because she arrived later, and needs to leave earlier due to LTN traffic again, as she needs to pick her daughter up in school at a fixed time. She is so tired and stressed and earning less money, that she is re-thinking her career and alternatives. Another woman was a teacher earning £8/h and decided a few years ago to become a carer as salary is better. She lives in Ealing and goes from house to house along the day, providing basic service for those in need. With Streetspace she is so tired and stressed having to navigate traffic – depending on her journey, sometimes driving, sometimes stationary in the bus – that she is reconsidering her career as a carer and thinking about going back to teaching, even if she will earn less.
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Camila: Dec 20
I live in Compton Crescent and take my little 2 years old boy to the nursery that is in Quintin Hogg Memorial Ground. The nursery opens at 7:30am and I start to work at 8am (from home). Before the closure of Hartington Road it used to take me no more that 15mins go to the nursery and come back so I could start at 8am.Now it is a nightmare as I have to rush my poor little boy in the morning to be ready before 7:15am (I need to be ready too) to be able to be in the nursery when it opens at 7:30am and then rush back home to try to be at my desk by 8am, which is almost impossible. I’ve been using the Staveley Road to go back home from the nursery but with the schools restrictions imposed in Staveley Road (no cars between 8-9am) I’m extremely concerned that I’ve been accumulating fines, as several times because of the traffic on the A316 I have taken Staveley Road just after 8am.If I don’t take Staveley Road I will have to take the A4 which will take me far to long to be at home at 8am. This is really adding a big hurdle into my live, my work and my little one as well. Do you think it is fair for a Grove Park resident to have to deal with this every morning and put her kid in so much pressure? I normally walk everywhere but I can’t do it to take my little one to the nursery because of the time constraint. I just use the car when is needed as in this case. I feel completely hopeless 
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Did anyone think about essential workers – district nurses, carers, GPs – when Ealing and Hounslow closed both North-South roads crossing the railway in Chiswick, making drivers go a long way round and choking up traffic? My husband is bedridden, unable to walk at all. He’s visited four times a day by two excellent carers, who work to a tight schedule with clients on both sides of the railway in Chiswick. They are women in their 50s who haven’t been on a bicycle since childhood, if then, and can hardly be expected to take to two wheels now. They need to use their cars both to get to work and to do their job. The closure of Turnham Green Terrace and Fisher’s Lane has added extra mileage, extra traffic jams, extra hassle and a great deal of extra time as they go from one job to another. We also have visits from the district nurses – who are anyway overstretched and have to cover too many clients over too great distances every day as it is – and GPs based in Chiswick Health Centre making home visits. No doubt they are having the same problems as our carers simply getting around Chiswick. There are other reasons I oppose the road closures – the extra pollution from traffic jams and longer journeys, the effects on small independent retailers in a neighbourhood with many older people who use cars to shop. Personally, I always use my bike around Chiswick and have never had a problem in Turnham Green Terrace, or any need to use the hole in the railway in Fisher’s Lane – the joy of a bike is there’s always a quick way round any temporary block. But if, heaven help us, these closures are to be made permanent, it is vital to arrange passes for essential workers, so they, as well as buses, can do their jobs with maximum efficiency and promptness.” – Bedford Park Resident, September 2020Some carers have also told us directly that they have even gotten PCNs themselves. And it would be up to them to challenge the PCNs themselves on top of their day jobs.
Reopen Our Roads. Save Our Community. Save Chiswick.
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Just had my first CHR experience since the roadworks opposite Sainsburys we’re added into the mix. Oh. My. God. Queues & queues of traffic like I’ve never seen in Chiswick before, one car tried to slip inside of me to turn left & was so close to me they had their wingmirrors folded in! Then
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Vicki:
So arriving home from holiday last night we were greeted with a lovely new sign which is just after Florence gardens saying no motor vehicles unless you have a permit… this means from Fauconberg road we can no longer access our own home as the sign is past the major junction and the other way the same, this is going to cause absolute chaos and dangerous driving, right where children are attending school, you do not know it’s there until you’ve committed, school busses that attend young children from the flats will be stuffed, everyone is literally going to have to reverse back then try and navigate getting back around down a narrow street! Cabs, delivery drivers etc etc are now buggered, we had no consultation on this! You’ll see if you are coming via Fauconberg Road the restriction isn’t apparent until you are committed; the same from Florence Gardens, from the other end you have driven around St Thomas road before you’ve got a sign! This is now feeling like a direct attack on working class people, key workers and those with physical difficulties. I worked all through lockdown and will be again I sincerely feel like throwing in the towel and for the first time in my life claim benefits, because it’ll be a lot less stressful and impossible for me to live a normal life! With covid and my job I can’t visit my parents, I’ll be damned if I’m getting on a bus, when I’m already exposed to 500 people plus everyday! I can’t ride a bike regularly as I’ve got 5 compromised discs in my back and a few in my neck, so when it’s being an arse I can’t physically do it! I don’t class myself as disabled as I manage it, nurses, carers, disabled, elderly etc etc what are we canon fodder?!!!
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The Bus Driver:
“There are big long queues” which slow down others’ journeys on Chiswick High Road. He added that it “is not acceptable” especially “when you think about the ripple effect of it”.
“Let’s watch out when everything goes back to normal … it’s going to be mayhem on Chiswick High Road,” he added.
“The people who are behind the idea, they need to go back to the drawing board and have a rethink and re-plan – listen to the bus drivers, listen to the locals, listen to the passengers and then we can get a better Chiswick” he concluded.
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Annabel:
So, heading east along CHR trying to turn right into my street in The Glebe estate. Now can’t turn right into Duke Rd. Devonshire Rd already closed except for access. Soooooo, either all the way down to Brackley Rd, or Dukes Ave and onto the A4 and into the Glebe from Hogarth roundabout. That really is displacing already displaced traffic. A joke.
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Anthea:
This is the traffic refuge that my 89 year-old mother uses to reach the chemist and the bus to Hammersmith.It’s being removed this morning to make way for the cycle lane, without any consultation.She’s said that the extra 150ft that she’ll have to walk to cross at the lights is enough to put her off crossing the road or using the bus.I’ll be sharing my view on this with LBH, cc Hanif Khan.
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Vicki:
Sorry I’ve used someone’s photo… but a sobering thought crossed my mind I’m assuming the bus stops will no longer have shelters? So come sun, wind, rain, hail or snow, those using London transport will be stood out there; old, disabled, school children pushing and shoving as they do; people with pushchairs, young children? Is this not a smack in the face of class? Lower classes are given no comforts or consideration? Another thought on the fact of ice etc how are the gritters going to get to the cycle lanes which we know clog up with rain water? So pedestrians will be expended to slip slop and slide through the cycle lane onto the bus island to get splattered with either slush or dirty rain water! Just marvellous!
Chiswick voices here!