CLARKSON ‘WRONG’ OVER SHARED SPACE

PRESENTER ADMITS ROAD SCHEME WORKS WELL

TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson has admit admitted he got it wrong by suggesting Ashford’s shared space scheme would lead to carnage. The former Top Gear presenter had pre predicted a “Jaguar dance of death” on the area around Elwick Road and Bank Street, where cars and pedestrians have equal priority, when the radical new road scheme opened in November, 2008. He said at the time: “Doing away with lights and pelican crossings is a bit like doing away with bolts in the scaffolding on a building site in the hope the labour labourers walk around a bit more carefully.” But when the subject came up dur during a talk by the controversial pre presenter in London on Tuesday night, he admitted: “I got it wrong”. Mr Clarkson, who was sacked by the BBC last year and is now working on a new show for Ama Amazon Prime, went on to say that he “often changes his mind” and that a similar scheme introduced on Kensington High Street in London had worked well. There have been no fatal accidents on Ashford’s shared space since it opened and the scheme has won a number of awards. The concept has since been adopted in a number of other towns across the UK.

Writing in his column in The Sun at the time, Mr Clarkson said: “In the same way that keepers at London Zoo could put all the animals in the same cage and sit back hoping that Baby Jesus will stop the lions from eating the goats. “Someone is going to be killed, you idiots.” He predicted “millions being mangled in a Jaguar dance of death.

“And if it doesn’t, it’ll only be because the good and sensible people of Ashford will continue to look and listen before stepping into the path of a two-ton car.”

Clarkson has also been critical of speed bumps on one of Ashford’s roads, taking to Twitter in July, 2014, after driving down Ulley Road in Kennington, to tell his 3.5m followers: “People of Ulley Road, in Ashford, Kent. With all those stupid speed humps, I hope you never need an ambulance.”

At the time, Clarkson and his two Top Gear colleagues, James May and Richard Hammond, had been filming the show on Romney Marsh.

Jeremy Clarkson was speaking this week at the China Exchange in Chinatown, London, a charity which puts on a series of debates and workshops.

For more information visit www.chinaexchange.uk

‘Doing away with lights and pelican crossings is a bit like doing away with bolts in the scaffolding on a building site in the hope the labourers walk around a bit more carefully’

A cyclist navigates Ashford’s shared space system