End of year report

Seasons Greetings to all LAWRRAG supporters

2010 draws to a close with more traffic, higher speeds, and a greater number of HGV vehicles both day and night, so a massive Well Done! to those elected to SERVE the community.

Looking for a career change New Year's Resolution - Get a job where there's no such thing as 'RESULTS' - become a Councillor.

Mobile speed camera action!

The mobile speed camera lay-by on Leeds Hill is at last being used. Who decides when it is used is not known, and whether it is only mointoring traffic in one direction is also not known. Nobody has told us anything about it.

When the van is in place it does have an impact upon traffic speeds, vehicles can be seen decelerating rapidly when the drivers realise that the van is there. Perhaps this could be a solution in itself - buy a cheap van, mark it up as a Police van, and just leave it parked there all day?

It is to be hoped that the van is used at times other than those witnessed by the writer, one Friday evening around 6.30pm, and one Monday evening around 8.30pm, when the traffic volumes, and overall problem is lessened. Time will tell, if monitoring at these times will lead the police to claim that there isn't really a problem ............ as they have done in the past.

Invitation from the Rothwell Record

In response to the following query sent by the writer to the Rothwell Record:

It occurred to me that over 3 months have gone by since the ‘lay-by’ issue was raised. Just a thought - as a follow up it would be good to find out from Stewart Golton how often the police have used the lay-by, what the results have been, and what a worthwhile investment it has all been - I think we all know the answer! The term ‘as much use as a chocolate fire guard’ springs to mind (take your pick as to what I’m referring to!).

The deputy editor replied:

I have chased this issue up today but am unable to get hold of Stewart at the present time. I will keep trying but in the meantime do you have anything to add? What do the members of Lawrrag think? (I can guess!) Would anyone be happy to comment or maybe write a letter (name and address can be withheld!)

This is good opportunity to keep matters in the public eye and, unlike our emails, the Rothwell Record is read by the local councillors.

We will make mention of the support from Alec Shelbrooke MP, and it would be beneficial to have the opinions of other supporters, even if these are only 'one-liners'. Please note that names and addresses can be withheld.

This is a great opportunity to say how you feel about the speeding, the HGV traffic, the councillors involvement, etc etc. Please consider giving an opinion, no matter how short, and email it to lawrrag@googlemail.com by Tuesday 17th August.

Until the councillors accept that there are or more than a handful of people complaining it remains an uphill battle.

Another development warning!

(Double click on image to read text)

With apologies to the Rothwell Record, the above article appeared in the August 2010 issue.

The article reports that 555 acres of land is up for sale on our side of the M62, suitable for residential, commercial, or leisure purposes. This land has been on the market before and the huge development then proposed for the site was rejected following substantial opposition.

Having failed once you can rest assured that significant expenditure, and lobbying, will now be going into trying to secure planning consent.

Anyone feeling really strongly about this land going for development should lobby their councillors, and MP. LAWRRAG is about 'traffic', and in this respect the potential traffic impact upon the area would be massive.

It might be considered far too early in the day to be getting concerned about this 555 acres being developed, but the issue is that the more we let the smaller developments within the area go through unchallenged, then the harder it is for any action to be taken about increase car, or HGV volumes, when something like this starts to get off the ground.

The situation is significantly worse than it was 6 years ago, and we've seen how concerned the councillors and the council are about it!

Media person wanted

One suggestion that has been made (again) is that Yorkshire Post newspapers might run a feature on how bad the situation has become and what little support there has been from the local councillors.

LAWRRAG has had mention in a positive light in the YP/YEP on a number of occasions in the past and although newspaper stories are short-lived, this has a lot going for it, particularly at the moment:

• There have been recent articles and letters in the YP newspapers about councillor’s payments, and entitlements. ‘Outrage’ seems to be a common thread.
• Local councillor Stewart Golton is now leader of the Lib Dems in Leeds and as such sits on the executive management board of Leeds City Council. (The surprise and bewilderment at this was best dealt with in the 18 June 2010 posting)

If this is to be followed up is there anyone willing/available to contact the Yorkshire Post? Your chance to become the Press Officer. It is our experience that if YP is to run a story they will want a photograph of ‘concerned’ looking residents, do we have volunteers?

More HGV Traffic?

(Double click on the image to be able to read text)

The Yorkshire Evening Post, Saturday 7 August 2010, ran the above article about a proposed waste incinerator development on 'the former Skelton Grange power station site in south-east Leeds near junction 44 of the M1'. This is in addition to the electricity-generating waste plant proposed for Cross Green.

Whether you accept that south-east Leeds should be the dumping ground for the city, county, or the north as a whole, the hundreds of thousands of tonnes of rubbish that are going to be incinerated are going to be taken in by road!

Reply from Alec Shelbrooke MP

It's pleasing to be able to report that Alec Shelbrooke MP responded to our communication the same day it was sent, a far cry from from the approach of the local councillors!

The main body of Alec's reply reads:

"Please forgive me for not getting back to you since the election, I have been a bit overwhelmed and I have got behind on a few things. My efforts to try and get this solved from a Council point of view were not successful at the time, however, I do intend to now lobby Cllr Keith Wakefield, to try and get the HGV ban in place that we spoke about. I will also meet with the Transport minister and try and do some "behind the scenes work".

I'm still with you on this, but I wont really be able to get in with anybody until we get back into the full swing of things in October. I will try and meet Keith Wakefield before then."

Thank you Alec.

Letter to Alec Shelbrooke MP

Dear Alec

It is now six years since the start of our campaign, well documented on our blog site, www.lawrrag.blogspot.com, and one year since you brought along the then Shadow Transport Minister, Robert Goodwill, to meet with us. It is also five and a half years since Leeds City Council heads confirmed that there was a serious problem with speeding along Leeds and Wakefield Roads.

Both Robert Goodwill and yourself were scathing of the ‘efforts’ of Leeds City Council, and our councillors, and supportive of our cause, and indeed you made certain local road safety commitments in your pre-election manifesto.

In the six years that the campaign has run, through equal measures of arrogance and ignorance, Leeds City Council heads, officers, and councillors have simply ignored all government guidelines put in place to protect communities from the issues we face, and have shown nothing but contempt for the rights and concerns of scores of local residents.

The intervening six years have seen traffic volumes rise, average speeds increase, noise levels increase, higher numbers of HGV vehicles, and as of now probably a five-fold increase in the number of night time HGV vehicles speeding through the area. Despite there having been two complaints to the office of Local Government Ombudsman, planning consent continues to be given to major developments that have a direct HGV impact upon the area. There is no reason whatsoever why this traffic shouldn’t be restricted to using the direct motorway links. Prior to the opening of the East Leeds link road we suggested that this would result in even more high speed, and HGV traffic, we were told by the ’experts’ that it wouldn’t ………….. IT HAS!

The things that haven’t changed during the six years are the very guidelines and recommendations cited at day one, put in place to protect communities.

Those of us that read your manifesto and have met with you were probably looking forward to some positive action, however given the governments recent, and frankly unbelievable approach to road safety funding, and the decommissioning of speed (safety) cameras, we appear to be worse off than before!
We have seen that Leeds City Council has no idea of the scale of the problem, and the councillors don’t care. The burning question is:

WHAT AS OUR MP ARE YOU GOING/ABLE TO DO FOR US?

We look forward to you earliest possible response.

We have refrained from sending this to members of the Leeds City Council executive board members as it would simply be passed down the line to one of their excuse mongers (it always has before).

On behalf of LAWRRAG

How to succeed in politics?

The last posting didn't quite tell the whole story in that there has been a major change locally -

Lib Dem councillor Stewart Golton is now leader of the Liberal Democrat group in Leeds, and as such sits on the executive board of Leeds City Council.

Lib Dem councillor Stewart Golton is now leader of the Liberal Democrat group in Leeds, and as such sits on the executive board of Leeds City Council.

This is the same councillor Golton who to date has ignored every government guideline with regard to planning, highways, and transport, that has been put before him, and has managed to be fobbed off time after time by non-elected council officers (See earlier postings).

Lib Dem councillor Stewart Golton is now leader of the Liberal Democrat group in Leeds, and as such sits on the executive board Leeds City Council.

It doesn't matter how many times you read it, it's true.

Post-election/s blues?

Following the general election the area has a new member of parliament, Alec Shelbrooke (Conservative). Alec Shelbrooke has had a mention before (see Labels > MPs), and has openly supported moves to do something about the traffic issues. That said, the former Labour MP Colin Challen supported the aims of LAWRRAG but was unable to do anything to bring about change.

There was no change within our area following the local election ...........................................................................

Useful Links - Planning and Noise

Look to the right and you will see reference to Existing government guidelines and policies. This information is available to anyone, which makes it doubly annoying that both elected and non-elected council representatives can choose to do what they want and ignore policies in place to protect communities.

In addition to the safety aspect one of the main sources of complaint is that of NOISE generated by speeding traffic, and HGV traffic. Not surprisingly there are government guidelines and policies in connection with this, and in the Useful Links section we have now added a link to Planning Policy Guidance 24: Planning and Noise.

Wanted - budding film makers.

A couple of years ago a night-time HGV ban was brought into force in Lofthouse and Ouzlewell Green, this came about through local residents action, supported by their Ward councillors. One of the measures taken was to film the night-time HGV traffic passing through the area. When shown to council and highways personnel the noise disturbance was clearly evident, and eventually a ban was introduced.

Any takers?

Speed Cameras - Inequality!

Over the past three days, and purely by coincidence, this writer has driven through 4 separate areas of Leeds where speed cameras are in operation - Middleton, Morley, Rodley, and Stanningley, and there are of course many more cameras within the Leeds area.

The residents living close by these cameras are protected against the danger and noise of speeding traffic, we are not, and yet the council knows that there is a serious speeding problem within our area.

A logical conclusion is that our safety and quality of life is of less importance than that of other rate payers throughout Leeds?

In a nutshell

There were many comments that could be taken from the recent emails of support however this one sums up the feelings of many of us:

Something clearly needs to be done about the traffic in Oulton, it is clearly ruining what has historically been a lovely place to live.

Complain, complain, complain!

We have previously referred to the fact that not enough people are complaining, and although we now have the support of over one hundred households, very few people have complained as individuals to the councillors or the council. We will continue to campaign and complain on everyone's behalf until possitive action is taken but THE MORE COMPLAINTS THE BETTER!

The councillor supposedly dealing with traffic issues is Stewart Golton stewart.golton@leeds.gov.uk

We can happily forward emails to Cllr. Golton with the individual complainants name and address withheld if preferred.

Support and communications

We have only just got around to sending out 'thank you' emails to everyone who responded to the flyer campaign, late last year.

Email communications - Our preferred email address as mentioned before is now lawrrag@googlemail.com (there are mail-merge and MS Outlook issues with the ymail account for those wondering why the change). Your email address - For reasons explained below we will only be sending unsolicited emails to notify you of important events or important postings on this site. A number of emails of support were sent from works email addresses, if there are liable to be problems in receiving emails at these addresses, or you would prefer to change your email address for updates please let us know. Spam filters - We do know that some email accounts will filter web-based emails out as spam. We will of course continue to reply to email correspondence.

Change to communication via the website - We originally communicated all information by email which eventually led to a couple of individuals asking to be removed from the circulation list because it was all getting a bit too 'intense' for them!

Further 'Folly' on Leeds Road

You may have noticed the construction of a single vehicle parking area almost at the top of Leeds Hill (Leeds Road). Apparently this has caused intrigue and we have been asked by the Rothwell and District Record if this is anything to do with LAWRRAG? It hasn't, but we can confirm what it is - It is a parking space for a mobile speed camera vehicle. Whether there are more proposed we don't know.

We have on file correspondence from the highways department to our councillors, stating that as the police do not feel that there is a problem with speeding along Leeds Wakefield Road their monitoring of vehicle speeds will be of low priority status. Their monitoring of night time HGV speeds will be non-existant.

Although the signs for mobile speed cameras were put up months ago and it is surely no coincidence that the parking area has been constructed right at the end of the council financial year.

No doubt this 'folly' will be used to show how our councillors are doing everything they can to address the speeding problem.

Proposed development off M62, Stanley - Objection

Details of the proposed development were very late in reaching residents in Oulton, Rothwell, and Woodlesford, so late that many people will have missed the deadline for lodging their objections to Wakefield City Council.

The proposed 24/7 development is massive, and will include industrial and distribution units, a business park, a hotel, fast food chains, and a rugby stadium for Wakefield Wildcats. More details, and links to the planning application submission documents can be found at www.wakefieldccg.co.uk If this development goes ahead there will be major traffic implications for our area.

Objection - A letter of objection has been sent in the name of LAWRRAG to Wakefield City Council on the grounds that the traffic generated by the development will have a direct and detrimental effect upon the quality of life for people living along and close by Leeds Wakefield Road - unless steps are taken to address the potential problems at planning stage. Sitting on the fence? - The development has received a lot of support in the local and regional press, and there may be many local residents who support the development, for that reason the LAWRRAG objection is solely related to traffic impact.

Support - update & Elected representatives response

In October 2009 the site was officially launched, promoted by a flyer campaign, and an article in the Rothwell and District Record. To simplify matters we asked that anyone wishing to add their support simply sent an email or text saying 'Support'. Not surprisingly there was an excellent response, and it is clear that the traffic situation also impacts upon a lot of people who don't live along Leeds Wakefield Road.

The launch of the site was also brought directly to the attention of councillors, MPs and prospective MPs, and we have yet to receive an acknowledgement from any of them!

Change of style

The more attentive amongst you will have realised that we've altered the appearance of the site, hopefully this is an improvement?

Contact details changed

Please note that for greater flexibility we've changed the contact email address to lawrrag@googlemail.com