June 30th, 2009 by highburyeast
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Highbury East has burst into bloom in June with the floral displays set to last all summer. Your local councillors have been helping with the the gardening effort with Terry officiating at the Olden Gardens Grand Opening ceremony on 24 June. John (pictured left) has been helping out planting the new flower beds at the bottom of Fieldway Cresent outside Central Library.
Meanwhile, elsewhere in Highbury, hanging baskets have gone up on Highbury Grove, Highbury Park and Blackstock Road. Work has also just started on a new planting scheme around the Boer War Memorial at the bottom of Highbury Fields.
June 18th, 2009 by highburyeast
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The owner of the Garage music venue at the bottom of Holloway Road near Highbury Corner has applied to the Council for permission to put 6 tables and 10 chairs on the pavement outside the venue. The Council is obliged to consult on this proposal.
We think it is a crazy idea: the pavement here is quite narrow, it is a very busy location and there is a heavily used bus stop nearby. As your local councillors we are therefore minded to oppose the application, but please tell us what you think by posting a comment on this site or by emailing us on councillors@highburyeast.org.uk.
June 16th, 2009 by highburyeast
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The Highbury give or take day takes place at Ambler Primary School on the 28th June.
Give or Take Days are a great way to recycle - just bring along any reusable items you don’t want any more between 11am to 1pm and take away anything you want from 11.30am to 2pm for free!
You can bring anything that’s reusable! Books, magazines, CDs, DVDs, tapes, toys, bric-a-brac, bikes, plants, kitchenware, furniture, electrical and electronic goods and good quality clothes. All electrical goods will be safety tested on the day. You must provide your own vehicle for transporting items.
Ambler school is here
June 2nd, 2009 by highburyeast
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Cllr Terry Stacy joined angry traders protesting outside Network Rail offices against a decision to evict them from their kiosks at Highbury and Islington station.
Network Rail made a decision to evict local traders from their pitches outside Highbury and Islington station and rent the sites to the highest bidder. The News kiosk, creperie, florist, and coffee stand are all under threat of closure. The traders collected a petition with more than 2,700 signatures, which they took their petition to the Network Rail HQ at Kings Cross this week. Terry Stacy, leader of Islington Council, has backed their calls to be treated fairly by the railway company, and joined the protest on the street.
Terry said:
“Network Rail bosses have a responsibility to the traders at Highbury and Islington. These local businesses have worked hard to build up their custom - they are trusted and valued local traders. The station needs improving, but it’s stupid to get rid of the good, unique things that are already here, like these kiosks. We simply don’t need another Starbucks here.”
June 1st, 2009 by highburyeast
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Local Lib Dem Councillor Laura, Terry and John are backing backing a campaign for one hour bus tickets for London bus users. The scheme, which already exists in other
European cities, would allow passengers to switch from bus to bus within an hour, for
a fixed cost of just one ticket. You can sign the petition by clicking here
Cllr John Gilbert said:
“It really is ridiculous that Londoners have to pay a new fare every time they change
bus. On some quite short journeys you need to change buses, so you’re paying £2
or more to just travel a couple of miles.
“Bus travel should be treated in the same way as Tube travel. You can already
switch from Tube to Tube on the same ticket so it makes real sense to allow people to
do the same with buses.
“One hour bus tickets already operate successfully in Paris, Rome and Brussels. It is
time London caught up and gave bus users a fair deal.
Explaining how the new tickets would operate Laura Willoughby said:
“I think one hour bus tickets would make bus travel very attractive to a lot of people
who often don’t use the bus at present. It makes sense. To get from Whittington Hospital to Newington Green takes 2 buses for just 3 miles and cost £2. With a 1 hour ticket the 40 minutes journey would cost just £1.
“The Liberal Democrats are challenging Boris Johnson to introduce one hour bus
tickets and people can support the campaign by signing our petition.
Did you know?
You can support the campaign by signing the petition on this website by clicking here
Figures released by TfL indicate that the average bus journey length is 3.54km (2.2 miles, 9 stops), and estimate that 16% of bus journeys on Oyster ‘Pay As You Go’ involve using a second bus within 60 minutes of the first.
In the third quarter of 08/09 there were 102m bus PAYG journeys (counting each bus boarded as a separate journey), for which the fares revenue was £79m, which equates to 18.8% of all journeys and 31.3% of all revenues.
When a bus is terminated short of its destination, passengers have to take the next bus. The driver of the following bus should be informed, but often they are not, and passengers have to touch in again and pay a further £1.00. This would be eliminated with the One Hour Bus Ticket.
Already, Oyster is configured to ‘cap’ the maximum fare you can pay in one day on buses and trams at £3.30. This means you would be charged again for your second and third journey (£3) and your fourth journey would cost 30p.
In Paris, passengers have 1 hour 30 minutes at their disposal between the first and last validation of the 1.60 euro ticket to carry out one or many trips. Brussels offers the “Un Voyage” ticket for 1.60 euro. In Rome the ‘Metrebus’ ticket costs 1 euro. It is valid for 75 minutes of travel almost anywhere in and around Rome and you can change buses as many times as you want during that time.
May 28th, 2009 by highburyeast
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After months of prevarication by Tory Mayor, Boris Johnson, Terry, John and Laura’s campaign for safety improvements to the cycle and pedestrian crossing over Holloway Road between Fieldway Crescent and Madras Place is at last bearing fruit. LibDem GLA member Caroline Pidgeon who has been campaigning alongside the three Highbury East Councillors has now been told by one of Boris’ advisers “that deliverable options could exist to enable us to provide a facility for pedestrians and cyclists without impacting on other road users”.
Translated into English, that appears to mean that they can make the crossing safer and they are at last working on what they call “interim designs” for the improvements, which they have promised to show us by the end of June. Interim designs are not the same as moving the traffic lights but at least it is some progress and Terry, John and Laura will be keeping on the pressure to make sure that Boris’ creaking bureaucracy finally delivers the results local councillors and residents have been campaigning for.
