Segregated cycle lane for Kensington High Street next month

By Owen Sheppard, Local Democracy Reporter

A segregated cycle lane spanning the length of Kensington High Street will be in place by late October.

Kensington and Chelsea council said the “experimental” route will be separated from other road traffic with “wands”.

And it will include “floating bus stops”, where the cycle lane cuts between the bus stop and rest of the pavement.

It will begin at the Olympia London, and run for one mile to the south-west corner of Kensington Gardens.

Work on phase one of the plan will start on September 28 and take about four weeks, the council said.

Phase two will involve changes being made to junctions along the routes, and will be undertaken by Transport for London (TfL) and be complete by the winter.

The council hopes it will encourage more people to visit shops and restaurants and commute to work without using public transport.

Councillor Johnny Thalassites, the council’s lead member for transport, said: “More people are choosing active travel to get around during the coronavirus pandemic, and this experimental route will give residents, commuters and visitors another option for travelling safely.”

A similar scheme by Wandsworth council has been criticised by residents.

Campaigners claim the scheme made traffic worse in Balham and Tooting, and that the wands made it difficult for businesses to receive deliveries from vans and lorries.

Kensington and Chelsea’s scheme includes “new all-day loading bays… so that high street businesses can continue to receive deliveries”.

The council also said it is liaising with commercial waste collectors and will provide specific advice on waste collections to businesses along the High Street.

Tom Frost, chairman of The Kensington Business Forum, said he hoped the route could “bring custom safely back to our shopping locales”.