Demonstration in support of CS11 to be held after petition against it attracts thousands of signatures

I'd urge everyone who cycles in that area to complete the consultation, a number of sections are optional, and it doesn't take that long.

The comments in the change.org "anti" petition are a depressingly familiar mix of ignorance about how taxation works, and pants-on-head stupidity.

It's hilarious that people arguing for vehicles, which cause the air pollution, to have access everywhere, are claiming to be concerned about air pollution.

I think we should counter the arguement that motorists *need* to have the right to drive on the Outer Circle with a new proposal to allow driving on all the park's paths. 

I mean if driving on the Outer Circle is essential then they deserve the right to drive everywhere in the park, surely?

Recognising that not everyone reading this is familiar with either London or Regents Park, I thought this might be helpful.  If only motorists had some alternative to the Outer Circle readily available to them.

A similar thread runs through objections to making traffic in Richmond Park one way. (Something which I disagree with the Richmond LCC about.)

Make traffic one way - like Centennial Park in Sydney, with half of the road width segregated for use by cyclists (and in line skaters, sigh). Makes life safer for cyclists - less absent minded overtaking by flustered/aggro drivers - also means your speed limit could go back up to 30 to alleviate need to drive a bit further. And really, if you are visiting the Park, you shoudn't really mind if you are forced to drive a bit further because presumably the park is the destination after all. Not at all. Biggest objections (when the issue was consulted on in 2002 - to the point of a JR application by one of them) was from the adjacent boroughs, Wandsworth, Richmond and Kingston. That's because all of the adjacent Boroughs have come to rely upon the park as a traffic alleviation device - or, more colloquially, a "rat run". (In 1998 an Origin and Destination Study carried out for The Royal Parks by Peter Brett Associates established that between 96% and 98% of traffic using Richmond Park during weekday peak hours and 80% at weekends was through traffic.) If you make the park less attractive as a cut through, you increase pressue on surrounding roads which means angry voters with pitchforks. (And while I am on the subject, it is perfectly possible to create a decent XC mountain bike course within the confines of the park while still respecting the things that make it an SSI - conservation doesn't have to mean exclusion.)

Parks - Regents Park and Richmond Park as two leading examples in London - should be as traffic free as possible - some traffic is necessary (the aim isn't to exclude people). But they shouldn't be a solution to poor road/transport infrastructure elsewhere and personal safety must trump a desire to get somewhere a little bit quicker.

The excessive use of capitalisation is the clear sign of a reasoned and thoroughly thought through argument. Good work.

Writing on change.org, Daniel Howard says

“It is strongly suspected that this scheme has been DELIBERATELY designed to cause maximum road congestion and make life as miserable as possible for motorists that we simply abandon our cars and vans and lorries and instead join Boris Johnson and Andrew Gilligan's utopian ‘cycling-vision’.”

He says this as if it's a bad thing.

As for Boris, it is easy to be utopian after he doesn't need to be reelected.  Tsk.

I am sure that the plan isn't deliberately to discourage driving to create a public transport/cycling "utopia".

But if it was, that would be ok.   The other half of how the Netherlands got so good, the bit that isn't great cycling infrastructure, is that urban areas are deliberately made unwelcome to motor vehicles. 

Daniel Howard doesn't realise that once people figure out that certain roads are congested, they'll either stop using them, or find another form of transport.  Which oddly enough, will lead to less congestion and lower pollution.

Daniel Howard sounds like a right prick.