TFL to replace London Gyratories

John Mx/LCC

Success for campaigners as Mayor announces death knell for sixties gyratories

Transport for London have announced that they plan to replace a number of London’s gyratory systems. The London Cycling Campaign have welcomed the news.

Vauxhall Cross

The LCC response in full: The London Cycling Campaign welcomes the Mayor’s concrete commitment to transform or ‘rip-out’ 33 gyratories – ‘relics of the sixties which blight and menace whole neighbourhoods’ to quote Mayor Boris Johnson – and to provide safe crossings for cyclist and pedestrians. We are pleased to see that that the funding for this programme has been increased to a more realistic £300 million from the original £19m and the sum later allocated of £100m.

Urgent action must still be taken to address dangers presented to cycling at many more junctions across London. Nonetheless this announcement vindicates the actions of the many thousands of people who have supported recent LCC campaigns to make junctions safe by adopting international quality of provision for cycling.

LCC chief executive Ashok Sinha said: “We congratulate the Mayor on this hugely welcome announcement. At last we have a firm commitment, and the funding, to tackle the main barriers to cycling as identified by cyclists in the capital. Rapid implementation of this programme will help reduce deaths and serious injuries to cyclists, as well make our roads safer for pedestrians too. We share the Mayor’s view that gyratories blight our capital and removing them will improve quality of life for all.”

The initial programme of tackling key London junctions (Better Junctions Review) was a response by the Mayor to the tragic deaths of two cyclists in 2011 at Bow Roundabout and the subsequent vigils and protests by LCC members and the families of the people who died. All the Mayoral candidates in 2012 promised to adopt continental grade standards for cycle provision on our roads when they signed up to LCC’s Love London Go Dutch campaign, and the Mayor wrote to LCC in 2013 promising action in response to our Space for Cycling protests at the Aldwych and Holborn gyratories.

The Mayor have highlighted 33 junctions where gyratories will be tackled and high grade cycle facilities provided. He makes a commitment to ripping out gyratories at Swiss Cottage, Archway, Aldgate, Vauxhall, Elephant and Castle, Wandsworth roundabout and other locations. They will be replaced by two-way roads “segregated cycle tracks and new traffic-free public space”.

Transport for London is undertaking to provide detailed designs of schemes next month and to start actual works in the second half of 2014. LCC has previously objected to the slow pace of progress at the Better Junctions Review announced in 2011. The programme, which has examined several dozen junctions, has yet to deliver large scale results on the ground. This time round the Mayor and TfL are promising that the “programme has been fundamentally refocused away from making minor, often cosmetic changes at a large number of junctions to delivering real and transformational change at the busiest and worst junctions.” Average spending at each of the 33 listed locations will be around £9 million.

TfL says that, in the last three years, more than 150 cyclists and pedestrians have been killed or seriously injured at the 33 locations that are being addressed under the programme. Leon Daniels, Managing Director of Surface Transport at TfL, said: “They are some of the busiest traffic intersections in Europe, so this work has been complicated. But we are now fully committed to delivering these junction improvements as quickly as possible, making London safer and more inviting for all.” There will also be works at some of the remaining 100 junctions previously identified in the Better Junctions Review as in need of improvements.

London Cycling Campaign website