Freewheeler has been quoted in the Guardian looking forward to the Coming Of Miliband:
"Apparently Ed Miliband is coming to Walthamstow this month, to lecture us all on climate change. I'm sort of looking forward to that, as our Labour-Lib Dem council is about to introduce five neighbourhood "improvement schemes" which involve a massive re-allocation of pavements and cycle lanes for car parking."
Freewheeler's "first solitary rifle shot" in advance of "the heavy artillery" was fired in his usual style, mocking the preachy local council for running pseudo-green enviro-campaigns while never quite getting round to practicing what it preaches.
His subsequent salvos continue to hit the mark.
Bob Belam, who as the man in charge of pot holes, car-parking and bins is a much maligned man locally - with a job which his Labour partners in the council rarely try to make any easier - did respond to Freewheeler and is quoted in the Guardian, though the statement does to me have some of the bland linguistic traits of having had the life kicked out of it by a vast committee of council spin doctors:
"We are committed to improving the safety of all road users in our borough. The highway improvement scheme in Forest Road will make transport safer and reduce the number of injuries to all road users as it is designed to reduce vehicle speeds between Hale End Road and Woodford New Road.
The scheme will involve reducing the width of the carriageway and adding cycle lanes on both sides of the road. Meanwhile pavement parking bays will be installed. Double and single yellow lines will be installed to eliminate parking across the cycle lanes and the white lines which mark the central reservation will be removed, as research shows this is a proven method of reducing vehicle speeds."
As even I have noted, the roads in question can have as many cycle lanes as the council likes to spend our money on, but if the council continues to employ people to block them by deliberately parking their own vehicles across the lanes, the rhetoric will continue to be unconvincing.