Greenwich residents angry as planning application is lodged for HGV’s to be re-routed down residential roads
BY JAMES TWOMEY
james@slpmedia.co.uk
Residents are fuming that a planning application has been lodged which will see at least 80 Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGV) per day re-routed down residential roads to service the construction of an enormous sewage system.
The Thames Tideway Tunnel is a huge sewage network under construction with one of the excavation points in Norman Road, Greenwich.
The vehicles were originally planned to access Norman Road via Blackheath Road and Greenwich High Road, which are main roads.
The proposed new route will take the HGVs down Greenwich South Street and the north side of Greenwich High Road, which circle around residential areas.
Tim Sweeney, whose mother lives in the proposed area in Queen Elizabeth College, said: “It’s absolutely shocking.
“The residents have very grave and serious concerns over the impact this will have on their homes, their lives and their health.
“I’ve never heard of this type of plan being introduced anywhere else, it’s a major part of Greenwich there are loads of tourists here and we’re not even sure if the roads have seen that volume of traffic before.
“The local residents are extremely worried and concerned environmental impacts on residents and visitors to Greenwich of running about 110 HGV lorries per day down two residential roads.”
The proposed application would see 80 lorries a day for three months on a trial period and then at least 120 a day for a further 12-15 months.
A holding area has been proposed for the HGVs to park in Greenwich High Road which would take up the existing space on the road.
At a Greenwich council planning committee meeting last week, residents raised the issue but Greenwich council has deferred the decision.
A spokeswoman for Greenwich council said: “More information is required from the applicant to justify the chosen option and whether other sites could be used.”
A spokesman for Thames Tideway said: “As we build London’s new super sewer to clean up the River Thames from sewage pollution, we are aiming to move as much material as we can by river.
Where this isn’t possible, we will need to use HGVs and, as part of our work at Greenwich, we require a holding area to manage HGV movements to site.
“The location of this holding area is still under discussion and we continue to engage with the local community to minimise disruption.”
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The tunnel is not only blighting communities across London but is unnecessary and a huge waste of money. Environment Agency data from sensors fixed to barges along the Tideway show that water quality already meets their requirements. This is due the billions of pounds spent on completed upgrade of sewage treatment works and the building of the Lee tunnel which on it’s own reduced Combined Sewer Overflows (CSO) by more than half. CSO’s only exist in Inner London and serve an area with a population of 3 million. The combined sewers are designed for a population of 4 million. Outer London (over 75% of Greater London) has seperate foul and surface/rain water sewers. Tideway propaganda claims that the whole of London has CSO’s and that the population served by those CSO’s is 8 million. Tideway propaganda campaigns were started by the previous owner of Thames Water, Australian bank, Macquarie. The reality is that they fooled the government into backing the tunnel as the only solution to complying with EU law. Throughout the world, cities with the same problem are using green infrastructure such as sustainable drainage systems, green roofs, rain water harvesting and in-sewer controls because they cost less, are sustainable and produce multiple benefits that a concrete pipe never can. I feel sorry for the communities in Greenwich who will have a degraded quality of life, probably for a couple of years. Incidentally, the tunnel will not stop all CSO’s. Millions of tonnes of overflows will still be discharged to the Tideway after completion.
Roland Gilmore
Steering Committee Chair
Thames Blue Green Economy
01132507035
07887573952
I am totally shocked to learn about the number of lorries planned to be travelling along Greenwich South Street where there are many families with primary school aged children as well as elderly people who would suffer from the pollution, noise and possible danger for crossing the road. There must be a way to fight this during the trial period.
There must be some other area where the HGV’s could be placed so that they could use the original route which is less residential.