Wandsworth Council is to suspend its Low Traffic Neighbourhood (LTN) trials following a high level review.
The LTN trials were introduced last month to make residential streets more bike and pedestrian friendly and to deter rat run traffic.
They were part of a series of measures introduced as part of the council’s Covid-19 response by freeing up additional space on the highway in support of social distancing and to promote alternative forms of travel as people gradually return to work.
The trials were also intended to support Wandsworth’s aim of combating climate change by encouraging people to use more sustainable forms of transport and tackling air quality.
However, an initial review of the trials has identified concerns with emergency access and traffic flows. Wandsworth Council added that this has been compounded by additional changes that Transport for London (TfL) is making to red route roads in the borough.
These include interventions on the A24 (Balham High Road to Tooting High Street and beyond) including moving bus stops, installing cycle lane segregation, banning turns at a number of junctions and removing parking.
The council said the scale of these A24 changes coinciding with its own efforts to establish LTNs on residential streets has caused confusion and long traffic queues, while concerns around rising Covid-19 rates and reduced capacity on public transport has meant that alternative travel options are currently limited.
In light of these initial trial findings the council said it has decided to suspend the LTN trials.
Wandsworth Council’s cabinet member for strategic planning and transportation, Cllr John Locker, said: “It is clear that the LTNs are not delivering the benefits we want to see. In fact it looks like the combination of changes in areas like Tooting, where TfL are making changes to the main high road, are unfortunately having the opposite effect.
“That is why we have taken the difficult decision to pause and re-think about how we can achieve our objective of delivering healthier, safer streets.”
The council said it will continue to review the impact of TfL’s road changes to the A24 in Balham and Tooting to see if the issues improve over the coming weeks.
