Peter Hartley

• WE, of course, want the Oxford Street district proposals to work for the long-term benefit of all of us, residents, workers, shoppers and visitors alike; but to do so the council has to be a lot more radical in its approach.

Unless there is a fundamental shift away from motor transport there is a real danger of us spending £235million and getting a prettier Westminster, but still blighted with incessant traffic 24 hours a day. What an extraordinary wasted opportunity that will be.

How we deal with the garden squares around Oxford Street is fundamental to the success of the scheme as by closing some, and preferably all, of the streets around them, we can gain the much-needed lung and oasis that will be needed if we are to cope with the projected increase in visitors when Crossrail opens.

Likewise large-scale filtering of traffic away from the West End, and particularly stopping the maze of rat-runs through some of our best-loved areas, is vital.

And thinking outside the box, collaborating with the Mayor of London to get the congestion charge introduced at the weekends, banning of all diesel vehicles, and removing a lot of on-street parking is essential.

We welcome the appointment of Cllr Rachael Robathan as the new leader of Westminster Council and would ask her to deal with the traffic issue as one of her top priorities. She might well be judged as to how she reacts to this critical issue.

PETER HARTLEY
Chair, Westminster Living Streets