Agenda item

To agree the public minutes and summary of the meeting held on 28 January 2020.

The Committee considered the public minutes and summary of the meeting held on 28 January 2020.

MATTERS ARISING

Beech Street Transport and Public Realm Improvements (page 2) – The Member who had raised this issue at the meeting on 28 January asked the minute be expanded on to also include the points she had made about children at local schools being particularly at risk from cars doing U turns, the Sub-Committee having information about the displacement of road traffic and pollution but seeming to ignore it and what she believed to be a problem with democratic accountability in the City Corporation with the perceived undermining of the ward committee structure making this matter worse.

The Chair was content for these points to be added and the Town Clerk undertook to expand upon the minute of the previous meeting accordingly.

Another Member requested an update on local consultation on this project. Officers reported that the traffic order would be in place in mid-March 2020. To date, 10,000 letters had been sent to local residents and businesses and that information available via GPS tracking showed that these had been successfully delivered to all addresses. Further to this, the first of seven scheduled drop-in sessions was scheduled to take place this afternoon with another set to take place later this evening and a further two next week.

Officers went on to report that they had also presented on the scheme at a public meeting of the Barbican Association  which had been attended by approximately 120 people. The concerns raised at this meeting were noted and would form part of the review of the scheme with any necessary amendments made in line with these once the scheme was in place.

The Member commented that he had been one of those in attendance at the public meeting referred to and commended Officers for presenting here. He stressed that the monitoring of and ongoing consultation around this scheme would, however, be critical. The Member questioned whether there were any Key Performance Indicators attached to the scheme to provide clarity on what outcomes were desired and how success against these would be monitored.

Officers commented that they had produced a summary of all points made at the recent public meeting and that these would be added to as subsequent sessions took place. They undertook to share these comments with relevant Ward Members as well as with members of the Streets and Walkways Sub Committee so that they could understand the issues raised. A Member commented that it would be helpful to have a fuller update at the next meeting of the Streets and Walkways Sub Committee meeting.

Traffic & Parking Service Programme 2020-2022 (page 8) – A Member clarified that the trial referred to in New York City concerned incentivising the public to report engine idlers as opposed to parking offenders. The Town Clerk undertook to amend the minute accordingly.

Another Member commented that he had made the point at the last meeting that any increase in income attributable to fixed penalties was undesirable and that Officers should look to minimise these. With the Chair’s permission, he asked that the Town Clerk add to the minute to underline this point.

RESOLVED – That, subject to making the amendments requested, the public minutes and summary of the meeting held on 28 January 2020 be approved as a correct record.