Swyncombe Avenue Restriction to Be Made Permanent
Council retaining the measure despite negative response to consultation
The road closure at the junction of Boston Manor Road and Swyncombe Avenue. Picture: Google Streetview
Hounslow Council has announced that it intends to make the ban on traffic turning into Swyncombe Avenue from Boston Manor Road permanent.
The closure is currently implemented under an experimental traffic order in which it was subject to review and a consultation was held earlier this year. A new traffic order is to be issued soon which will mean that the measure is no longer in place on a trial basis.
The report on the consultation shows that all but one of the 133 residents of Swyncombe Avenue who responded were in favour of the restriction.
The council’s analysis of the responses shows that over 70% of respondents did not believe the closure was necessary with 749 people opposed. There were 222 responses in favour, 133 of which gave their address as being on Swyncombe Avenue. The vast majority of residents on Boston Manor Road who responded were against the scheme. A large proportion of those opposed lived in Ealing Borough and made up around half of those opposed who gave an address.
The council also contacted the emergency services about the closure and no response was received.
Data published by the council shows that westbound flows on Swyncombe Avenue have decreased by 32% from 5002 vehicles a day in 2019 to 3420 vehicles a day in July 2022 and eastbound flows have decreased by 97% from 4851 vehicles a day in 2019 to 164 vehicles a day in July 2022.
The scheme’s aim was to encourage active travel modes such as walking and cycling and the council collected data on pedestrian and cyclist numbers on Swyncombe Avenue in November 2021 and July 2022 but did not collect data prior to implementation for comparison. When comparing overall active travel figures from 2021 and 2022 there has actually been a decline, which the council blames on seasonal variation in data collection.
On Boston Manor Road, traffic flows have decreased by 28% when comparing the most recent July 2022 traffic data to the November 2016 “before” data. Northbound traffic flows have decreased by 38% from 9181 vehicles a day in 2016 to 5658 vehicles a day in 2022. Southbound traffic flows have decreased by 15% from 7824 vehicles a day in 2016 to 6663 vehicles a day in 2022.
However, on Windmill Road, traffic flows have increased by 19% when comparing the most recent July 2022 traffic data to the June 2018 “before” data. Northbound traffic flows have increased by 31% from 4335 vehicles a day in 2018 to 5685 vehicles a day in 2022. Southbound traffic flows have increased by 8% from 4551 vehicles a day in 2018 to 4925 vehicles a day in 2022. The council says this increase is partly due to the Whitestile Road diagonal closure and, as Windmill Road is the only road on which significant increases in traffic has been measured, it believes that a significant amount of vehicle journeys are no longer occurring in the local road network.
There has been some increase in bus travel times in the area including on the E2, E8 and 195. For instance, the E2 bus route weekday run times between Orchard Road and Julien Road has increased from an average of 4.8 minutes to 7.4 minutes during the evening rush hours.
The council did give some consideration to local access being restored with ANPR camera enforcement, but this was dismissed as it was felt that the current No Entry system was being effective and that the process of issuing an experimental traffic order and holding a consultation would be repeated. The
council is still analysing the performance and scalability of other ANPR schemes in the boroughbefore progressing any further restrictions of that nature.
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October 7, 2022