Background to the project
Residents and businesses in Hampstead Town and Frognal wards are concerned about difficulties they experience moving around in the neighbourhood, including high volumes of traffic, particularly large vehicles, and poor air quality.
The local community has a vision for people-friendly streets, which is set out in the Hampstead Neighbourhood Plan and more recently was confirmed in a broad-based community survey undertaken by the HTP.
HTP has secured funding from Camden Council’s local Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) programme to seek support that can help the community achieve its vision and proposes to appoint a specialist transport consultancy to:
· Understand the community’s view of the current situation and its vision for the future
· Identify the barriers to achieving the community’s vision
· Recommend strategies to overcome these barriers, demonstrating they command community support
· Provide follow-up advice on implementation of these strategies and reporting on progress after 3-5 years.
For decades local traffic problems have been exacerbated by the “school run” of cars from outside the area
We believe that a citizen-led initiative, based around Camden’s “We Make Camden” strategy that empowers local communities, has the potential to create a joined-up Transport Plan – based on the area’s Neighbourhood Plan - which promote joined-up thinking, better air quality and make the area more pleasant to live in and move around.
The proposed approach received strong support at a meeting of the heads of over 20 community and residents associations in May 2023, following which HTP ran a structured tender process that led to PJA’s appointment in January 2024.
The “school run” is drawn in by Hampstead’s many fee-paying schools and as far back as 2002 local councillors wrote a 74-page report on the problem.
In 2020, Hampstead Neighbourhood Forum’s Survey on Measures to Encourage Walking and Cycling identified traffic as the main barrier, but this problem has persisted in recent years.
Tackling overall traffic volumes was underlined by HTP’s first online survey, in June 2021, when 469 people shared their vision for the Hampstead area
Traffic was cited as the number one issue and we received over 700 individual comments and suggestions. Strikingly, half of those responding said they found it difficult or very difficult to move around Hampstead. Walkability and improved bus services were key.
Our aim is to make conflict between local residents and Camden Council a thing of the past through ways of working that involve the community in devising the strategy from the outset, so that each future initiative will be part of a picture that everyone understands and supports.
It’s an exciting journey that we haven’t embarked on in Hampstead for over 20 years and we believe it can work for other Camden wards.
The proposed approach received strong support at a meeting of the heads of over 20 community and residents associations in May 2023, following which HTP ran a structured tender process that led to PJA’s appointment in January 2024.