Barbican Podium Phase Two - what drainage problem?

The City have produced a summary of the feedback they received in their consultation, and there is no mention at all of the matter of FIXING THE DRAINS before they press ahead with their sexy big budget project despite earlier explicitly acknowledging the matter. 

Click to read the whole document

Beech Street Zero Emission Scheme - reversed for now

A recent letter from the City explains that due to the combination of administration mistakes and a legal challenge the current 'experimental' Zero Emission Zone scheme will revert to allowing all traffic:

"The experiment (which can only last a maximum of 18 months) will conclude on 18 September. Beech Street will then reopen to general traffic and the closures at the junctions with Golden Lane and Bridgewater Street will be removed."

Here is the full text of the letter:

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Dear Occupier

As you may know, the experimental traffic order (ETO) for the Beech Street zero emission scheme has been the subject of two legal challenges. The first, a statutory challenge of the validity of the ETO, was heard in October 2020. 

The judge found that while the ETO was valid and could continue, the City Corporation could not follow the usual “truncated” process for making an ETO permanent due to non-compliance with two procedural regulations. The first was that the ETO documents were not available for public inspection at Guildhall between 23 March and 22 April 2020 (during the first Covid-19 lockdown). The second was that the City Corporation did not provide an adequate statement of reasons to explain why the ETO was being introduced. The consultation carried out in respect of the ETO was found to be compliant with legal requirements. 

As a result of this finding, if it was decided to promote a permanent traffic order with the same effect as the experimental zero emission scheme, it would be necessary to follow a separate process to introduce a new traffic order. 

The second legal challenge was a judicial review of the decision by the Streets & Walkways SubCommittee in February 2021 to continue the experimental zero emission scheme. This was heard on 29 and 30 June 2021. The judgement, issued on 10 August, concludes that the experiment remains valid and dismisses the claim. 

An interim order issued when the judicial review was granted permission to proceed, prevented us from undertaking any further work on a permanent scheme that replicates the current experiment. As a result, planned public consultation on a potential permanent scheme for Beech Street was put on hold. The recent judgement means that we can resume work on a potential permanent scheme. 

The experiment (which can only last a maximum of 18 months) will conclude on 18 September. Beech Street will then reopen to general traffic and the closures at the junctions with Golden Lane and Bridgewater Street will be removed. 

Islington Council will be reviewing the ETO in relation to Fortune Street and will write to its residents both in Fortune Street and the surrounding area to advise whether the restriction on Fortune Street will also be removed on the 18 September. 

We will continue to monitor the Beech Street experiment between now and the 18 September. Despite the impacts of Covid-19, the experiment has enabled us to collect useful data on traffic and air quality and to understand the impact of the scheme on resident access and deliveries.

We are investigating whether it will be possible to retain the new central reservation gaps (for Lauderdale Place and Shakespeare/Defoe car park) on Beech Street. This will be subject to an independent road safety audit. 

Infrastructure changes made for the experiment, such as the new cameras and signage, will be left in place but disabled, so that these can easily be reused if a decision is taken to proceed with a similar permanent scheme in the future. 

The project team and your elected members remain committed to improving air quality on Beech Street and in the wider area. We plan to launch a consultation on options for Beech Street before the end of the year. Some of these options could be relatively quick to implement. At the same time, we plan to begin engagement to understand aspirations for wider changes to improve air quality and the experience of walking, cycling and spending time in the Barbican and Golden Lane area. 

In the meantime, we are continuing to progress separate improvements to the zebra crossing on Golden Lane and the Fann Street and Brackley Street junctions with Golden Lane. 

Please do not hesitate to contact the project team if you have any questions at beech.street@cityoflondon.gov.uk 

Many thanks 

Ian Hughes 

Deputy Director, Transportation and Public Realm

Farewell Vision Fibre Media (VFM)

Here is the farewell email from the Vision Fibre Media (VFM) people:

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Good afternoon Barbican Estate residents,

We wanted to get in touch to let you know that we are handing over all communications regarding your broadband, TV infrastructure and telephone services to 4th Utility today.

4th Utility now have full control of the network and will cover all support queries with their 24-7-365 UK based Customer Care team.

From today we will be closing the support@visionfibremedia.com inbox as all support emails will be dealt with via 4thUtility. Any outstanding tickets logged prior to today are already on the system and will be addressed. Please save support@4thu.co.uk on your email safe list.

What do I do next?

4th Utility have been sending out emails in batches to VFM customers from the email address barbican@4thu.co.uk with a URL / link unique to you showing your account details on their website www.4thutility.co.uk.

Customers need to be migrated from the VFM legacy billing platform on to 4th Utility billing platform, and it needs to be done manually due to GDPR. Once customers click on the link they have been sent in the email, they can check their package is correct and input their payment details.

Billing will not commence until your September invoice so please do not cancel any existing payments as this will be done for you after the last payment in August automatically.

If you have any further questions, not received your link or would like any more information, please do not hesitate to get in touch using the information below.

24/7/365 dedicated support team:
Tel: 0800 102 6223

Email: support@4thu.co.uk
barbican@4thu.co.uk

Kind Regards

Fortune Street Park Survey

Fortune Street Park Survey

The London Borough of Islington wants to hear your views about Fortune Street Park! Please take a few moments to complete their survey at www.islington.gov.uk/ fortunestreetpark and help inform concept designs for improvements.

The survey closes on 13 September.

Looking South West

Looking North East

 

Reporting Podium Lights on the Estate

From the BEO:

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Reporting Podium Lights on the Estate

As some of you may be aware all Podium light issues are the responsibility of our colleagues in the Highways Department of the Built Environment.

In order to improve upon the present working methods, a dedicated email address was created to report these lighting issues on the Barbican Estate.

May we ask residents to continue to please help us with reporting and use the following email address dbebarbicanlighting@cityoflondon.gov.uk for this purpose and contact the team directly, if any light concerns are seen on the Podium.

Please can we ask that you also copy in your House Officer, so that they may track and follow up on the repairs on your behalf.

This inbox is monitored on a daily basis via the electrical group which in turn allows them to address problems as soon as possible, whilst also providing direct feedback.

We hope you will continue to assist us in this way of working, which allows us to manage things more proactively.

Noisy Work Hours

The rules for noisy works (e.g. using power tools) have been updated.  In particular there is no longer a defined quiet period from 12:00 to 14:00 for resident/private contractor work.

I understand the quiet period was dropped because it was deemed to be unenforceable.  If you are being disturbed by works and/or need some quiet time to work (e.g. for a meeting) the recommendation now is that you knock on the door of the flat which is the source of the noise and ask for some quiet time, or that you ask the BEO or your house officer to contact the flat for you.

From the BEO
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Noisy Work Hours

Barbican Contractors: 9am – 5pm

Works carried out by our contractors (Metwin etc). They will try to not start before 10am but certain works need a full day to complete and may have to start from 9am. Emergency Works may have to take place outside of these hours.

Residents Private Contractors: 10am-4pm

Alterations in Leaseholder's flats (please note there is no quiet period). If there are complaints of noisy work starting before 10am or after 4pm please contact the House Officer for your block.

City: 

8am – 6pm eg road works, gas, electric water repairs & work not controlled by the Barbican Estate Office.
(Quiet times of 10-12 and 2-4 stipulated)

Eyebolt testing - Aug 16th & 17th

From the BEO:

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Eyebolt Testing 2021

Ben Jonson House and Shakespeare Tower

Eyebolt testing for abseiling will start as below, on the following blocks:

Week 3

• August 16 - 17 Ben Jonson House
• August 18 - 20 Shakespeare Tower

The eyebolts are tested to ensure that they are safe and fit for use for abseil, during the window cleaning process.

Please DO NOT REMOVE any tags on the eyebolts as these denote the test date. Please download the six month schedule from the website here, in the residents' information pack under the cleaning and recycling tab.