Mayor and TfL launch new team to crack down on congestion
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New team of officers to be deployed at key junctions and roads to keep traffic flowing
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Team will work closely alongside the Metropolitan Police Roads and Transport Policing Command
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Officers will target ten key routes that carry half a million bus passengers and 300,000 car and taxi passengers every day
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TfL team will have powers to direct traffic for the first time
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Follow @TfLTrafficNews for the latest road traffic information
A
new team of Road and Transport Enforcement Officers is being deployed
to key traffic routes across London to crack down on illegal or
inconsiderate behaviour and other problems
that cause congestion.
The
new 40-strong Transport for London (TfL) team - that will rise to 80 by
next Spring - will help deal with problems such as illegal stopping or
unloading of deliveries, which
can cause delays to drivers and bus passengers.
It will work closely with the TfL-funded Metropolitan Police Roads and Transport Policing Command, which was launched by the Mayor in January and with 2,300 officers, is the largest policing command anywhere in the country. The team will help to move unlawfully stopped vehicles, issue Penalty Charge Notices to illegally parked vehicles and clear unnecessary or poorly set-up roadworks.
It is the first time that TfL will have its own officers who will have the power to direct traffic around congestion on London's roads. This includes issues such as breakdowns and collisions. They will also access real time information and data and send intelligence back from the street to TfL’s control room.
Mayor of London, Boris Johnson MP, said: “This is one of a number of targeted actions we’re taking to tackle congestion and reduce delays on the roads. In January we launched the Met’s Roads and Transport Policing Command and this new team will work closely with them to help keep London moving. They will play a key role in tackling problems that lead to tailbacks and take a zero-tolerance approach towards inconsiderate or illegal behaviour that can cause unnecessary gridlock.”
It will work closely with the TfL-funded Metropolitan Police Roads and Transport Policing Command, which was launched by the Mayor in January and with 2,300 officers, is the largest policing command anywhere in the country. The team will help to move unlawfully stopped vehicles, issue Penalty Charge Notices to illegally parked vehicles and clear unnecessary or poorly set-up roadworks.
It is the first time that TfL will have its own officers who will have the power to direct traffic around congestion on London's roads. This includes issues such as breakdowns and collisions. They will also access real time information and data and send intelligence back from the street to TfL’s control room.
Mayor of London, Boris Johnson MP, said: “This is one of a number of targeted actions we’re taking to tackle congestion and reduce delays on the roads. In January we launched the Met’s Roads and Transport Policing Command and this new team will work closely with them to help keep London moving. They will play a key role in tackling problems that lead to tailbacks and take a zero-tolerance approach towards inconsiderate or illegal behaviour that can cause unnecessary gridlock.”
The team will be
alerted to congestion build ups both through TfL’s network of traffic
cameras and through utilising the ‘eyes and ears’ of the almost 25,000
bus drivers, who are
calling in any issues to the TfL control room so that they can be
reacted to swiftly and intelligence can be analysed to prevent problems
from recurring.
In
addition, they will work with businesses along the routes to help
improve the way they receive and manage deliveries, giving advice on
re-timing or consolidation to reduce the
impact of deliveries during peak times.
Leon
Daniels, TfL’s Managing Director of Surface Transport, said: “This new
team of officers is being deployed to actively solve the problems that
cause delays for drivers and
bus passengers. These are often caused by inconsiderate behaviour, like
illegal stopping or parking in bus lanes, and the new team will tackle
this head on – adopting a zero tolerance approach to obstructions that
cause congestion.
“We
work hard to keep London’s traffic moving every day, through our state
of the art traffic signal technology, Traffic Control Centre and
innovations in social media. Having
more people on the ground will deliver an even better service to all of
London’s road users.”
The
new team is complemented by the up to the minute real-time journey
information TfL provides to advise road users of congestion and to
suggest alternative routes. The @TfLTrafficNews
Twitter feed, which this week gained its 500,000th follower, is an
immediate source of information about traffic conditions across London.
The TfL website continues to be updated regularly with month-by-month
breakdowns of the build programmes for all TfL
schemes, showing the locations of different phases of the builds and
the areas where traffic may be affected.
TfL
is already taking a similar zero tolerance approach to issues that
cause congestion at the Blackwall Tunnel. In 2010, alongside the
Metropolitan Police and Driver and Vehicle
Standards Agency (DVSA), a dedicated enforcement presence was
established as well as additional over-height vehicle detection
equipment and penalties for drivers running out of fuel and causing
unnecessary delays. Since starting the initiative, there has been
a 32% reduction in collisions, incidents and events causing congestion
at Blackwall Tunnel.
TfL’s
open data policy also enables app developers to access real time data
feeds on current disruptions and planned works, as well as traffic
cameras across the road network,
to produce travel information apps to help road users be able to plan
their journeys and avoid disruption.
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The 10 key corridors that the Roads and Transport Enforcement Officers will
be focusing their attention on initially, are:
- Gracechurch Street, Bank
- Eastcheap to Leadenhall, Bank
- Gosport Street to Hoe Street, Walthamstow
- Hackney Road to Balls Pond Road, Dalston
- Ladywell to Loampit Vale, Lewisham
- Highshore Road to Heaton Road, Peckham
- Manor Park Road/Craven Park to Manor Park Road/High Street,
Harlesden
- Kensington High Street to Notting Hill Gate, Kensington
- Columbia Avenue to Balmoral Road, Worcester Park
- Gatton Road to Trevelyn Road, Tooting.
