Apologies for absence were received from Councillor Head and Peter Dolan.

In accordance with the Members’ Code of Conduct, Members are requested to declare any interests orally at the start of the meeting and again immediately before consideration of the matter. Members are reminded to specify the agenda item number to which it refers and whether the interest is of a personal or prejudicial nature.

Members are also reminded of the requirements of Section 106 of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 that they should declare and not vote on specified matters if they are two months or more in arrears with their Council Tax payments.

Agenda item 6 - CAR CLUBS

Councillor Cardy declared a personal interest by virtue of being a member of a car club.

Councillor Stanier declared a personal interest by virtue of her husband being a member of a car club.

Agenda item 8 - PARKS IMPROVEMENT PROGRAMME

Councillor Cardy declared a personal interest by virtue of being a trustee of the Hampton Fuel Allotment Charity.

Councillor Seymour declared a personal interest by virtue of being a member of Hampton Common Friends.

Agenda item 9 - ROAD SAFETY IN RESIDENTIAL AREAS SCRUTINY TASK GROUP - FINAL REPORT

Councillor Stanier declared a personal interest by virtue of knowing Professor Goodlad (one of the objectors to the Petersham Road traffic calming measures), who had written to the committee.

To consider and approve the minutes of the last meeting on 14 January 2010 attached.

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on 14 January 2010 be received and approved, and the Chair be authorised to sign them.

·         Mrs Hill

·         Mr Kebble

·         Ms Smart

·         Mr Roxby

·         Mr Holder

There were no Executive decisions called-in.

The report summarises the car club project in Richmond upon Thames and the outcomes of the project with regard to the targets set for it by Smarter Travel Richmond. It also provides information on the review of the bays implemented under first experimental traffic order.

Report of the Head of Highways and Transport attached.

The Committee received representations, which have been summarised below:

Mrs Hill

·        Car clubs had been promoted by central government, who had also been promoting the car scrappage scheme. This meant that they were promoting two different schemes, with two conflicting aims.

·        Figures for the number of cars removed from the roads varied greatly, depending on what company's website you looked at.

·        The majority of car club users reported that they did not own a car before joining the scheme.

·        There was no evidence to back up the claim that people dispose of their cars once joining the scheme.

Following questions to Mrs Hill, she advised the meeting that:

• She was concerned that the Council was claiming the car clubs had been a huge success, but actually had no evidence to substantiate this claim.
• She may support car clubs if it could be proved cars were being taken off of the road, but she still had concerns as they discriminated against pet owners by not letting animals in cars.
• As far as she was aware, 60% of car club car users did not own cars before joining a scheme.

Mr Kebble

·        When the survey, which looked at the number of people who would consider joining a car club, was carried out it found that a large number were "likely to join".  So why, when car clubs were introduced, did the targets not reflect the numbers of people indicating they would join?

·        As the targets were so low, did the Council actually believe in car clubs?

·        The savings that could be made by using a car club were over inflated and involved more hassle for the user; there were membership fines for damage on cars and for cars that were left dirty

·        A lot of time also needed to be spent checking cars each time one was hired.

Following questions to Mr Kebble, he advised the meeting that for the membership of a car club to pay off, the mileage covered would have to be so low, the removal of that level of CO2 emissions would not be noticeable.

Ms Smart

·        The car club scheme was not as convenient for its users, as is being stated. Many of the people of Richmond were part of an aging population and therefore needed their own cars for mobility reasons.

·        Many of the car club cars were rarely used and some people who lived by a bay often reported that cars could go days without being used.

·        Bays took away space in controlled parking zones, which people were paying for via their permits.

·        Central government was proposing to give people incentives for buying electric cars, so Richmond upon Thames should be responding by giving preferential parking for them instead of car clubs.

Following questions to Ms Smart, she advised the meeting that

• She would not support car clubs, if they could be proven to work. This was because she felt that support should be given to electric cars instead.
• Car club bays were also often placed in heavily congested areas and took up much needed parking bays.
• She felt the Council was coercing residents by making it impossible for them to park their own vehicles.
• There should be a fair balance of parking spaces between the number of car club users and people driving their own cars.
• She supported the expansion of electric car spaces and reducing CO2 emissions, although added that man-made CO2 was not proven to be damaging the environment.

Following questions to the Cabinet Member and officers, the committee was advised that:

·        The council was unable to obtain detailed information from car club companies due to data protection issues.  Car club companies would however be approached to provide Richmond upon Thames specific information, as collected by company surveys.

·        The Council had received letters of support for car clubs.

·        Most CPZs in Richmond upon Thames were oversubscribed and proved difficult to find spare parking spaces in.

·        If a car club car removed two cars from the street, it would be a net loss of one car and this was seen as a positive contribution from car clubs.

·        As bays were being introduced on experimental traffic orders, residents and businesses could object should they wish to, until the bay was made permanent.  Some bays had been moved following concerns raised by residents.

·        Private parking areas had been used for car club spaces, but this was a private arrangement outside of the Council’s control.  Officers stated that bays on public roads were preferable as they enabled better accessibility and provided a more visible car club presence.

·        Van clubs were being introduced, with the first 6 such vehicles coming into use at the end of the month.

·        It was recognised that Whitton and Hampton had the worst coverage for car clubs and this was being looked into as the Cabinet Member wanted a more even coverage with at least one car club bay in each ward.

·        Council staff now had access to car club vehicles and the council was no longer in possession of pool cars.

·        Car clubs could potentially provide electric cars, although due to the nature of such vehicles, a lot of ‘down-time’ would need to be built into the service to allow for charging.  Car clubs were however being encouraged to purchase cars with the lowest emissions.

·        A variety of car clubs with varying prices were being encouraged to provide a service in Richmond upon Thames as this provided choice and created competition.

·        Car clubs were perceived as being a success although some types of evidence were, by their nature, time consuming to build up.

Views expressed by members of the committee included concerns that the lack of solid evidence to substantiate the success of car clubs undermined the case for car clubs in the public mind, and that the Council should do more to provide a demonstrable benefit to the borough.  There should be more car club cars, particularly in less well served areas and where parking spaces were less in demand.

RESOLVED that a recommendation be sent to the successor committee, stating that a report be received in 6 months’ time which measured the success of car clubs in a meaningful way.

Recently published road safety statistics confirm that Richmond upon Thames is more than two years ahead of Government targets for reducing casualties. However, at the meeting of the Environment and Sustainability Overview and Scrutiny Committee on 24 June 2009, members agreed that scrutiny could “add value”, to work already underway, by setting up a task group to investigate not only how our roads might be made safer, but also environmental benefits of traffic calming measures, and how we might encourage more walking and cycling.

The Committee is requested to comment on the final report, the recommendations and to determine how it wishes to monitor the recommendations.

Report of the Road Safety in Residential Areas Task Group attached.

The Chair of the task group, Councillor Mumford, thanked members and officers involved.  Councillor Mumford endorsed the report and wanted the already low level of casualties to continue to be reduced.

The Committee received representations, which have been summarised below:

Mr Roxby

Mr Roxby had been a long term supporter of a reduction in speed limits across both Richmond and London and supported a move to a blanket 20mph limit.  Mr Roxby also gave details of various plans that he felt would be of benefit to the aim of reducing the number of accidents, including a new order of priorities on the roads.

Mr Holder

The report was welcomed, although some aspects needed to be enhanced, such as introducing a “walking policy”.  Mr Holder said that many past plans for Teddington were left incomplete, mainly because of the staff turnover at the Council.  He also stated that he would like Teddington to be considered as a location for some sort of 20mph speed limit trial.  Mr Holder reiterated his longstanding concern that officers should develop an expert level of local knowledge.

Following questions to the Cabinet Member and officers, the committee was advised that:

·        A 20mph zone could be enforced without the need for physical features such as speed tables, chicanes, etc.  This was because many areas already had an average speed of below 30mph because of street features such as narrowness and parked vehicles.

·        Technology for enforcing 20mph zones currently did not exist.

·        ‘Naked streets’ were ruled out because of issues with establishing liability in the event of an accident.

·        It was not possible to produce a comprehensive data base on accidents, as the main statistics available to the Council were ones compiled by the Department for Transport.  Some accidents mentioned were not recorded, or were not publicly available.

·        2/3 accidents in urban areas were not due to speed, but to unpredictable circumstances.  However, speed was the focus of the task group because it was a known cause of accidents and an achievable target.

·        The highways and transport department did have a good knowledge of where dangerous stretches of road were, mainly because of reports from councillors and members of the public.

·        For the purpose of the task group’s work, high street locations and business districts were included in the term “residential”.

·        The only roads within the borough that the Council did not have control over were the A205 and the A316.

·        Modal shift could not be assessed as part of recommendation 4 because results were difficult to quantify when part of smaller pilots.

·        Any pilots would be aiming to make roads safer, reduce pollution and allow road users to feel safer.

The following views were expressed by members of the committee:

·        The report should state which roads were not under the control of the Council..

·        There was a suggestion that there should be a separate piece of work which looked at what roads should be classified and declassified.

RESOLVED that:

1. The report be noted, subject to amendments being made by the Chair following comments from members of the committee.
2. A progress report be received 6 months after any recommendations were implemented.
3. Thanks to Glenna McCulloch, Christian Scade, Aurang Zeb, Chris Smith and all those who had assisted in the preparation of the report, be recorded.

This report looks back at the original principles of the Parks Improvement Programme, and shows the actual spend for years 1-4 and the current spend for the final year which ends on 31st March 2010. The report also looks at the lessons learnt and the success of the investment programme.

Report of the Head of Parks and Open Spaces attached.

It was noted that the green flag awards were similar to the ones awarded to beaches.

Many parks had ‘friends of’ groups that the Council communicated with in order to establish what people wanted from parks.  Comments were also being invited from park users via signage at sites.  The Council was providing ‘fit points’ for general use, which could be easily moved between parks.

Young people were encouraged to provide feedback and there had been sessions at some of the popular Larks in the Parks summer events, as well as having involvement from local schools and the youth service.  A text message service had also been trialled.

The parks department had been spending a lot of time building relations with local communities.  The was helped by the parks department only promising residents what it could deliver.

There were plans to explore utilising parks for more events.

The committee and Cabinet Member commended the parks department for their work, and were particularly impressed at the positive progress made in building good relations with residents’ groups and consulting the public.

RESOLVED that the report be noted.

This report asks the committee to form a list of recommended items for its successor committee to consider after the May 2010 elections.  It also asks the committee to consider what has, and has not, worked in the previous four years.

Report of the Senior Democratic Services Officer attached.

The following views were expressed during consideration of this item:

·        There should be more task groups.

·        Single ward issues should be avoided.

·        Attempts to resolve issues should be made before a matter is called-in and taken to the committee for consideration.

·        The committee should retain the word “Sustainability” in its title.

RESOLVED that the following list of items be recommended to any successor committee with responsibility for ‘Environment’ functions: