Enfield Council are bidding for Liveable Neighbourhood funds from Transport for London to improve the streets of Angel Edmonton. We have until this Friday (31 January) to support them! Please respond here – take a moment to create an account if it’s your first time.
The area centres on Fore Street, from Enfield’s borough with Haringey in the south to Edmonton Green in the north, with the North Circular running through the middle.
Here are some of our ideas – you might want to use them in your own response. Email us at info@betterstreets.co.uk if you think we’ve left anything out.
Make streets safer from crime
The area around Fore Street has entrenched problems of drug dealing, sex workers and fly tipping, affecting how ‘liveable’ the streets feel. We would like to see Liveable Neighbourhood funding address this, for instance with lighting and CCTV in dark alleyways, and coordinated action to keep streets clean. Perhaps residents and businesses could get support to adopt unloved areas of streets to improve and help create a sense of ownership.
Stop rat running in residential neighbourhoods
Some neighbourhood streets suffer from drivers taking shortcuts to avoid the Hertford Road, particularly its junction with the North Circular. We would like to see the neighbourhood around Raynham Road south of Fore Street and the neighbourhood around Craig Park north of Fore Street benefit from area-wide low traffic neighbourhood treatment, perhaps closing side streets with bollards where they meet the high street. This would open up areas to be part of a walking and cycling network as well as benefit residents.
Make it easier to get to school without a car
We’d like to see school streets, where traffic is banned at school run hours, for all the schools in the area – such as Raynham Primary, or Brettenham Road, which has two schools on it.
Make it safe to get to Silver Street station on foot
There is a crying need for a safe, signalised pedestrian crossing over Sterling Way so that people can reach the station in safety. The current indirect crossings don’t work – people naturally cross via the most direct route or ‘desire line’, putting themselves in danger on a busy road.
Make it safe to travel by bike
Fore Street’s cycle lanes stop well short of the North Circular. We would like them to continue south over the North Circular via a junction that’s made safe for cycling and all the way to the borough boundary. From here, a cycle route could connect with Haringey’s Cycle Superhighway 1 to continue south.
We would also support quietways, such as on College Close to connect cycles safely with the station, and along Joyce Avenue and an improved railway bridge to connect people to Bridport Road, North Middlesex Hospital and further west by bike. (Bridport Road would also need work to reduce its traffic – perhaps a bus gate.)
However, quietways shouldn’t substitute for safe bike lanes on Fore Street itself, where people need to visit shops and get safely over the North Circular by bike.
At Silver Street station, there should be a safe connection by bike from Fore Street and from Pymmes Park, which connects with an east-west quietway. There also needs to be secure bike parking at the station.
Add greenery and seating
Fore Street especially could do with an injection of greenery, better public realm and places to spend time rather than pass through. We would like to see rain gardens, parking spaces transformed into parklets and plenty of seating.