Search for route that will make Hampstead Heath safer

Published: 15 July, 2010
by DAN CARRIER

THE risk of a serious accident involving a truck and a walker on Hampstead Heath is so great that a new way has to be found for vehicles to get to a staff yard. 

On Monday, members of Hampstead Heath Consultative Committee discussed a report by transport experts MVA Consultancy on how vehicles get to the Parliament Hill staff yard. 

It warns that there is a serious risk of an accident if nothing is done.

Last year, plans to build a vehicle-only route from Gordon House Road, past the Lido and round the edge of the Enclosure cricket pitch caused uproar among walkers and people living in nearby Lissenden Gardens. 

Now, the City of London, which manages the Heath, has appealed to the public for help in solving the problem of getting vehicles to the staff yard.

Heath committee chairman Michael Wellbank said: “We have now got a report that identifies the fact that the Highgate Road entrance is an area of high risk. It is incumbent upon us to do something about it.”

He hoped people would send the City suggestions. “I do not know what the answer is,” he admitted.

Since a report highlighted the danger of a shared route past the tennis courts, the City has employed two safety stewards to walk in front of vehicles. But it says the cost of doing this is too much in the long term.

Heath committee member Ed Fordham said he believed people had been misled by the use of the term “road”. 

“We have a problem with the Highgate Road entrance and the idea of it being a new road,” he said. 

“It is not a road – that is a misunderstanding. But we do need to get the vehicles away from an area where kids leave schools.”

Mr Fordham said the issue needed a radical approach. 

“We need to think about this – perhaps we could access the yard through William Ellis School, after 4pm?” he said.