Minutes of ICAG meeting on 9th October 2013 at 7.30-9.30pm at the Town
Hall, Upper Street N1

Present: Oliver Schick, Sheridan Kelly, Ernestas Jegorovas, Stephen
Taylor, Alison Dines, Keith Macfarlane, Michael Johnson, Adrian Williams,
John Ackers, Chris Ashby, Suzanne Fogg, Diana Lockwood

Apologies: Deborah Maby, Caroline Russell, Charlie Kiss, Mary Ann Tarver,
Robert Harston, Paul Standeven

Matters arising
Number of Cyclehoops to be installed around St Andrew’s School, 
Keith to contact the Council again to check this.
ICAG wish list.
John said that finally the Local Implementation Plan (LIP) is now
available on the Council’s website and that he would be speaking to Eshwyn
Prabhu at the Council about it. The new Council Leader has just been
announced and is Richard Watts.
Bag snatching incident at Old Street junction.
Alison had still not contacted the local police but would.

Agenda
Old Street/City Road junction.
Oliver Schick from the Hackney Cycling Campaign (HCC) spoke to the meeting
about the Old Street/City Road junction. Describing the current roundabout
as one of the worst wounds in the London landscape he said it was designed
in the 1960s and now that the area is developing as London’s ‘silicon
valley’ the opportunity should be taken to return the junction to its
original crossroad design. This would make it a better connector and help
create a more people focused environment. TfL are against this idea as
City Road is a perimeter road for the congestion charge and TfL believe
traffic flow will impeded. TfL and Islington Council favour a peninsular
design in which either the northwest side or the southeast side will be
closed with a build out (the peninsular) jutting into the centre. However
Oliver did not want to spend time discussing these proposals, instead he
hoped ICAG would support HCC who were sending a deputation to the full
Hackney Council meeting on 30th October to ask them to support HCC’s plan
for the junction to be changed to a crossroads. The meeting voted on the
motion ‘ICAG support the change of the Old Street/City Road junction to a
crossroads rather than the peninsular scheme favoured by LBI and TfL’.
There were 10 votes for the motion, none against and two abstentions.
For more information on HCC’s proposals see their response to the
Shoreditch Space and Place Shaping Plan on their website.

Safer Lorries Campaign.
Andrea was not present to discuss a recent incident when he was assaulted
by a Council refuse truck driver. Islington’s (now former) Council Leader
Catherine West had signed up to the pledge of the LCC’s Safer Lorries
Campaign and it was agreed that ICAG should contact the new Council Leader
to see if the borough was achieving the targets. Alison would draft a
letter to Richard Watts and the borough’s Transport Manager and circulate
it to the ICAG Committee.

LCC AGM.
This was being held in Islington on Saturday 19th October and members were
encouraged to attend and vote for the new LCC Trustees as in the past only
10% of the membership had voted.

Camden & Islington Air Quality Summit.
This was being held on Thursday 17th October at Islington Town Hall,
starting at 5.30pm. John and Michael had registered and others were
considering attending.

Cycle Superhighway (CSH) on Hornsey Road and Sussex Way.
There had been a rumour that the CSH might be switched from Holloway Road
to Hornsey Road and Sussex Way and John had e-mailed Andrew Gilligan, the
Mayor’s Cycling Commissioner, about this. (He was told to get in touch
again in about six weeks.) John said that the key issue was whether we
wanted to make the case for Holloway Road, even though it is not clear
what the future of CSHs will be as AG is not committed to them, given
their safety record and their requirement for major treatment. The
general feeling of the meeting was that although it is a very busy road,
with the huge number of motor vehicles making the air quality poor, it is
wide and contains many destinations such as the four stations, the shops,
the university etc. as well as being a direct route to Upper Street and
central London so therefore should have much better facilities for
cyclists and be made safer. John felt we needed to pre-empt the decisions
that are currently being made by AG. For years LCC’s goal had been to
achieve a network of cycle routes and then CSHs were created and the
network idea diminished. Now with CSH out of favour TfL are looking again
at spending money on minor roads so persuading them that Holloway Road
should be improved could be hard, even though Hornsey Road and Sussex Way
have real limitations. Suzy, Tom and Michael agreed to draft a document
supporting improvements to the Holloway Road by the next ICAG meeting.

Drayton Park.
Chris had sent his letter about Drayton Park and the removal of the road
narrowing to Deborah for reworking but had not heard from her. He agreed
to re-work it himself and circulate it to the Committee.

Any other business
Community Speed Watch.
Caroline Russell of Living Streets had been in touch with the Islington’s
Police Borough Commander and he is very aware that the local injury
figures for people on foot and bike are getting worse. He is interested
in raising awareness of speed as anti-social with a community speed-watch
scheme. Caroline wondered if any ICAG members would be interested in
taking part in such an initiative and Stephen, Suzy, Chris, Michael,
Sheridan and Alison all said they would, timing and other commitments
permitting. Alison to let Caroline know.

Danbury Street lollipop lady.
Suzy reported that this lady had had a Police Community Support Officer
with her recently.

ICAG banners and business cards.
The ICAG banners used on our stalls need replacing. Also despite
Bridget’s best efforts last year an ICAG business card was never produced,
although Keith’s little list of the regular ICAG activities and contacts
was excellent for handing out. Suzy agreed to re-visit the business cards
and ask at the LCC office about banner suppliers.

Little Green Ride.
The monthly LGR will take place on Sunday 19th October.

Targeting university students.
Michael asked if ICAG targets university students and was told we had been
to a fresher’s fair at City University once but the students were more
interested in freebies than joining the LCC. Also a number of those
involved at the time felt they were old enough to be the students parents
and that it was something younger ICAG members should take on. However
the group welcomed any initiative Michael wanted to consider and Suzy said
the LCC were focusing on students and would be launching some schemes
soon.

Gillespie Park quiz night.
This will be on Friday 22nd November and Chris wondered if ICAG would like
to form a team. A number of people were interested and he said he’d
forward the information to the e-group.

DATE OF NEXT MEETING: Wed 13th November 7.30-9.30pm Town Hall, Upper
Street N1