Over the last two years, the council has been meeting regularly with tenants of the Elephant and Castle through a forum called the Shopping Centre Liaison Group. In addition, several other meetings have been held with shop owners from the Walworth Road and the market traders. Throughout 2005 and beyond, the council will increase the number of meetings with local businesses and will try to reach as many as possible that will either be directly or partially affected by the regeneration plans.

How is the car free idea going to work?

The introduction of the Congestion Charge in February 2003 has substantially reduced car traffic flows in the roads leading to, from and through the Elephant. Over the same period Walworth Road bus numbers have increased substantially. The general thrust of the London Plan is to support improvements that will encourage more journeys to be made by public transport, on foot or by cab or bike.

In practice, the customer numbers that the Elephant and Castle will need to attract could not possibly be accommodated by car use, hence the emphasis upon measures to make the use of the tube, bus and train facilities more pleasant and convenient. This will support the introduction of the tram and will make walking and cycling safer and more attractive.

The exceptions to this will be car parking provision for the disabled and access for deliveries and servicing of commercial premises. Outside of the core commercial area residential parking will be at a level of approximately 25% i.e. one car parking space per four residential properties but with provision made for car sharing schemes to be introduced.

 


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