In Oxford playwright Karim Khan\u2019s award-winning play, Brown Boys Swim<\/em>, Kash and Mohsen, two local schoolboys, are waiting at the bus stop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n MOHSEN: They literally tore down the bollard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n KASH: Where\u2019s that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n MOHSEN: By Cowley Road. Princes Street, and this cyclist comes up to them \u2013 \u2018put that back\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cue laughter from a local audience familiar with Oxford\u2019s bollards and how they became a national story. East Oxford\u2019s Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) were introduced in May 2022. For months the UK media seized upon stories of the plastic bollards proving a target for vandals and thieves. Coverage included a Panorama<\/em> documentary, \u201cRoad Wars\u201d, and an article in the The Times<\/em>, \u201cLow Traffic, Big Bust-Ups\u201d. The plastic bollards were finally replaced with lockable wooden posts in March 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n East Oxford\u2019s LTNs were introduced as part of the government\u2019s emergency active travel 2020 fu<\/a>nding<\/a>. According to the Department for Transport:<\/p>\n\n\n\n LTNs work by minimising through-traffic. A successful LTN makes walking and cycling more convenient than using a car for short trips.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Before they were rolled out by the County Council for an 18-month trial there was rigorous consultation on the LTN schemes. Residents were assured that the emergency services, key consultees, would be given keys to the lockable bollards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The wooden bollards have transformed East Oxford. Every day streams of children cycle up and down Magdalen, Southfield and Divinity Roads to get to and from school. Prior to the LTNs, thousands of vehicles used Divinity Road, a residential road that narrows to a single lane at the top, as a cut-through. Children were driven to school because it was too dangerous to cycle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe reduction in traffic since our LTN went in has had a positive impact on Pegasus,\u201d says Magdalen Road children\u2019s theatre director, Georgia Bradley.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “At our busiest times we have seen a significant rise in audiences arriving either on foot or by bike, which is preferable to vehicles clogging up the road. It has led to a spike in families coming to the area to enjoy the local coffee shops and restaurants along with the theatre.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Local mother of two, Emma was not a fan of \u2018the concept of LTNs\u2019. She changed her mind when the wooden bollards arrived. \u201cI felt safe cycling with my children to school and nursery.\u201d Her 5 year old daughter, who has since learned to cycle will, however, be put back in the car to get to school, a mile away, from January 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On 17 October, Oxfordshire County Council\u2019s Cabinet made the East Oxford LTNs permanent. But as part of alleviating the traffic congestion caused by the closure of Botley Road by Network Rail, residents have been told that the bollards on Magdalen and Divinity Roads and James Street will be removed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTo remove the LTN’s wooden bollards and reopen Magdalen Road to traffic would pose a significant safety risk for children,\u201d says Georgia Bradley.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n For residents of Divinity Road, the County Council\u2019s decision to reopen their road to emergency vehicles, taxis and a number of other exemptions brings back memories of 1985. In this year Divinity Road, like East Avenue and Union Street, had a gate installed half-way down to prevent rat-running. Unlike East Avenue and Union Street, Divinity Road\u2019s gate lasted only 3 months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to cycling campaigner Dame Sarah Storey, \u201cI don\u2019t think I\u2019ve ever visited a school where all the kids don\u2019t put their hands up when I ask, \u2018who would like to cycle to school?\u2019 It\u2019s down to us adults to enable this.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Oxfordshire County Council has made a commitment to Vision Zero. Will it provide guidance for children who currently use East Oxford’s roads to cycle to school about what they should do until the bollards are replaced? Let’s hope so.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Jemima Hunt<\/p>\n East Oxford\u2019s Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) were introduced in May 2022. For months the UK media seized upon stories of the plastic bollards proving a target for vandals and thieves. Coverage included a Panorama documentary, \u201cRoad Wars\u201d, and an article in the The Times, \u201cLow Traffic, Big Bust-Ups\u201d. The plastic bollards were finally replaced with lockable wooden posts in March 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11354,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[156,4],"tags":[26,146,139,31],"class_list":["post-11186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-homepage","category-on-yer-bike","tag-active-travel","tag-cycle-to-school","tag-cycling-in-oxford","tag-ltns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11186"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11186\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11355,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11186\/revisions\/11355"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyclox.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Why do we have LTNs?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Local reactions<\/h2>\n\n\n
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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nThe LTNs are weakened<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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