On the first morning of a traffic-free Oxford Street, Cllr Tim Barnes, Deputy Leader of Westminster City Council, told BBC Radio London that many of the questions the council has raised for years "even today, as traffic comes to an end, haven't been resolved".
Speaking to Aaron Paul on Monday 26 October, Tim said Westminster had never simply resisted pedestrianisation: "We actually put forward our own ideas for pedestrianisation in 2018 and at various other points." The problem was always the traffic the street needs and where it would go. "We just couldn't find ways that would practically work."
Harder to reach for disabled people
"How are people going to get to Oxford Street now that the bus routes are generally about 100 metres away? It's going to be very difficult for people with accessibility issues, people in wheelchairs and so on, to get to the street. There is no step-free access from Oxford Circus Tube, and they used to mostly use buses and taxis, which will now be banned."
Tim said it was still not clear how the street would be cleaned and managed, how it would be kept safe, or what level of policing there would be.
Traffic pushed into the side streets
The buses, taxis and delivery vehicles have not gone away, Tim said, and nor has the plumber's van when "those shops that might spring a leak in the day" need one. "How is the traffic that gets pushed onto the side streets going to fare? Will that create problems for businesses and residents away from the street itself, which might outweigh the good that's being done for retail?"
Holding the Mayor and TfL to account
"We'll be monitoring for traffic problems, for noise problems, for pollution issues, and taking those back to TfL and taking those back to the Mayor and basically charging them with responsibility for fixing problems if they've created them."
Asked whether the council could back the scheme if it succeeds, Tim said Westminster has always wanted it to be the best scheme it could be. But "we still have significant doubts that this will be a net benefit for London as a whole. Visitors may see something better. It may not be better for the people who live and work in Central London." The council will keep an open mind and keep the pressure on, "making those good bits good and the bad bits less bad".
"He didn't even tell his own side"
Tim reminded listeners that Labour was running Westminster when the Mayor made his announcement. "He didn't even tell his own side that he was going to do it. So this isn't a mayor that's really concerned with local democracy... and he really hasn't been concerned by the issues that have been raised by those who live and work here and know the area best."
An icon of British retail
Tim lives about five minutes from Oxford Street, and it is his local shopping street. "I just think that we're going to take an icon of British retail, an icon of what it is to be London, and turn it into something that's just going to be full of international shopping chains and really could look much like any other big shopping street anywhere in the world."
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