Carriageway repairs in Willesden

Disappointed yet again that none of my nominations for pavements or roads in need of repair or renewal were successful. Only two Willesden roads feature in the list - Buxton and Deacon Roads - will have the carriageway resurfaced in 2010/11. At this rate, it could take up to 50 plus years to restore our roads and pavements to good order.  As yet there is minimal work on dealing with the great number of pot holes in Willesden.

Pedestrian Refuges

I have been concerned that there is a need for a pedestrian refuge on some roads in Willesden as it can be hard to cross the full width of the road safely. I asked Transportation about how such refuges are agreed and implemented and they have given me a technical answer. I am advised that they are provided individually, but more often as part of a larger scheme. The primary of a refuge use is to serve the public's need to cross the road where a formal pedestrian crossing cannot be justified. It serves a secondary purpose of separating opposing traffic flows, and calming traffic speeds. However, they do sometimes require the loss of some on-street parking and this is not always welcomed in residential streets. The criterion is accident reduction, or serving a pedestrian's "desired crossing line". The kerbing and tactiles are not expensive, but it is usually necessary to get a live electricity feed in cross carriageway ducts to serve the illuminated bollards. Again, it may be necessary to prevent parking which in turn needs a traffic order and parking restrictions. Much depends on the location. Let me know if there's a site you think should have a pedestrian refuge.

Nominating roads for repairs

Councillors have the opportunity to nominate roads where there is a need for repair or renewal. However, no guarantee they will be included, but I have submitted the following:

Footway repairs:

Tarmac side of Bertie Road (reported 3 years running!)

Paving by bus stop, close to bus garage, High Road

Harlesden Road: between nos. 2-40

Tarmac side of Deacon Road

Beaconsfield Road

Carriageway repairs:

Gowan Road

Hawthorn Road

Beaconsfield Road

The Marie Celeste of NW10?

Residents using Willesden Library Centre have expressed concern about what they see as a decline in our "flagship centre".   For several years I had the pleasure as lead councillor of seeing the library grow in the services and resources it provided, when, for example, both the museum and archives were relocated. Now residents regret that the cinema and cafe have gone, that the reception desk is often unstaffed, that there is a drinks vending machine in the reading area and that the outside area is left littered and untidy.  In the first few days of the snow, there was no gritting to protect visitors from the icy and dangerous conditions in the car park.  A Neighbourhood Working proposal was to fund the training in security of reception staff so they could legally play a more supportive security role. This was declined by management.  The current Lib Dem/ Conservative administration do not appear to have plans or proposals for reversing what we see as this downward trend.

Too many estate agent boards?

Sick of seeing an explosion of estate agent boards down your road?  Did you know they can be controlled by planning regulations? `For Sale' or `To Let' boards are limited to only one board on each road frontage and they must be on the building or land to which they relate.  It is unlawful for more than one estate agent to erect a sign on any property even if is has more than one road frontage.  Even more important is that for sale and to let notices must be removed 14 days after the sale or letting.  I am pleased to report that Brent planning service take their regulatory role seriously and do pursue offending estate agents.  Have just heard that the council has recorded 27 convictions this financial year in relation to illegal estate agents’ signage in the Willesden area and others are being investigated.  Let me know if you have any concerns in your road.

Housing stock - maintaining balance

Found the following statistics recently.  Slightly more Brent residents live in houses (54%) than in flats (46%).   The relatively high respective proportions of households living in semi or detached houses (35%) and in purpose built flats (27%) illustrates the range of Brent’s housing stock and the Borough’s diverse townscape; which ranges from suburbia in the North to very dense inner city streets of terraced houses and flatted blocks in the South.  Just over half of Brent’s households live in owner-occupier homes (54%) with most of the remainder either renting from a social landlord (25%) or privately (17%).

I am particularly interested in maintaining the balance between family housing and flat conversions. The borough has the policy to protect family-sized housing from avaricious developers.  It is therefore good to know that the planning service does sometimes refuse an application (using policy H17) that would result in the loss of “a small purpose-built family dwelling” failing to “aid in the retention of mixed and balanced communities through a variety of housing sizes.”

I am delighted therefore that some recent planning applications have been refused because of overdevelopment, loss of family housing or lack of adequate amenity. I had submitted objections to applications for properties in Kings, Meyrick and Huddlestone Roads and for Stevens Cottages and all were refused on good planning policy grounds.

Empty homes in Brent

I have been concerned that the council’s empty properties function had been scaled down. In a borough with an extreme need of more homes, this looked like a mistaken action to reduce costs. The empty property function moved into the Housing Solutions Team, resulting in a scaling down of the service.

The service has since been revived but only as a result of the council receiving external funding from the West London Housing Alliance to fund a long-term empty property officer post.  As part of the bid for this funding, 10 empty properties have been identified and the funding will be used to bring back the properties into use.  One is a well-known uninhabitable eyesore - 31 Dudden Hill Lane – where an earlier planning application in 2008 sought to convert the warehouse area into flats. However, this was refused. The hope is that this new grant will promote a new and successful application and some decent accommodation provided at the site.

Dumpers get best service?

For the first time I have to dispose of a bulky item too big to transport to the Park Royal Recycling Centre.  Being a responsible resident, I arranged for it to be picked up and paid the £25 charge.  I now discover it will be TWELVE DAYS before it is collected!  Now if I had dumped it on the pavement, it would probably be cleared within a day or two.  So dumpers appear to get a better service than responsible residents!

Plan for Learie Constantine Open Space approved

As a local councillor I have had a lot to do over the years with listening to residents' views and promoting the necessary improvements to the open space in Villiers Road. Thanks to the Labour Government's "Playbuilder" scheme, Brent has been given generous funds to improve this and other open spaces for children's play.  The Parks Service used "Groundworks" to do the independent consultation. It is good to see that work has started on the site. There are some conditions intended to address local residents' concerns. The site will not be used between dusk and 8 am and gates will be closed between these times so neighbours won’t be disturbed in the evenings.  The condition to restrict lighting is also to avoid disturbing neighbours. There is finally a limit to the height of fencing to 2.4m in height from pavement level to ensure the site has a good visual appearance.

Willesden Safer Neighbourhoods Police Panel

Attended the Willesden Green police panel this week. We are fortunate to have such a good safer neighbourhoods team who are making good progress in the targets panel members set them. Targets set have been addressing anti-social behaviour around the Library Centre, speeding vehicles and graffiti. Problems around the library have virtually stopped - helped in part by making the outside walls less attractive to sit upon!  Earlier this year around 50 street drinking incidents, there are now virtually none.  We changed this target to reducing burglaries – especially important in the Christmas period. There have been several speed testing operations around schools and some drivers found to be without insurance or using mobiles. There has certainly been a reduction in graffiti ‘tags’ around Willesden. Recording and tracking ‘tags’ is an essential element of the improvements, as is the successful court action against perpetrators.