Consultation was clearly a sham

Cllr Alison Born is promoting a Low Traffic Neighbourhood (LTN) for the Church Street area of Widcombe (her letter in last week’s Chronicle, 17 February 22).

She cites a survey of residents in 2020 and presumably must have made a plausible case to have the area included in the list of 15 proposed “Liveable Neighbourhoods”.

Please can I ask why the detail of this proposal (along with similar proposals in all other 14 areas) was not included in the recent Liveable Neighbourhood consultation held over Christmas 21?

Clearly many similar self interest groups and councillors had carefully prepared such proposals during 2021, following the first LN consultation at the end of 2020.

So why the reticence in making others aware of the detail, some of which might make excellent sense e.g a crossing at Prior Park Road which she now mentions?

We can only assume such secrecy because wider knowledge of road closures might well have raised legitimate concerns from emergency services, bus operators, employees, employers and of course other residents, who could have their own roads choked by diverted traffic, so making their own neighbourhoods less liveable and adding to overall pollution.

This consultation, without detailed content so clearly available but deliberately kept secret, was a vacuous sham.

It seems to have been designed to tick boxes rather than hold any meaningful dialogue with other than self interested groups aiming to keep traffic from “their roads” aided and abetted by councillors currying local favour in a cynical vote gathering exercise.

John Morgan

Bath