(Approved for release by Mr Dobson) Dear Moira Gibb,

Little Green Street

Following our meeting on 24 April, the developer’s submission of the Construction Methodology Statement (CMS) and subsequent exchanges with your highway engineers, residents of Little Green Street have asked me to take up with you personally their continuing concerns about the safety of themselves, their families and their homes.

When we met in your office, you accepted that the issues raised were not merely highways technicalities but involved conservation, nuisance, planning and, above all, much wider safety considerations. You agreed that no decision on the CMS should be reached before Camden had carried out a comprehensive safety audit either in house or commissioned from an outside body with the necessary expertise. From the recent correspondence the Little Green residents have received from Mr. Martin Reading, it is clear that no such audit has been carried out or even initiated. Mr. Reading indeed makes clear that the duties and powers of the highways engineers are limited and, consequently, so is the scope of their concern and involvement.

I feel obliged, therefore, to ask you to take personal charge of this matter to discharge the personal undertakings you gave when we met. As long ago as 2OO2, your officers were of the opinion that Little Green Street would be unsuitable even for the intermittent

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traffic to and from the development once it was built and occupied. If it was then ‘clearly unsuitable for the proposed use’ and refusal was recommended because ‘the site

does not have a safe access’, how much more unsuitable and less safe it must be for the construction traffic. The Council’s sensible decision to refuse the planning application was overturned on appeal by the Planning Inspectorate but even their decision was sub j ect to the condition that the Council should be satisfied with the Construction Methodology Statement. That being the case, you are entitled both in law and in practice to say that from an overall safety point of view you are not so satisfied. Why else should the condition have been laid down?

Even within the circumscribed scope of the traffic engineers’ report, not enough proper weight seems to have been given to 

• the consequences for vehicle and pedestrian traffic in Highgate Road ;

• the dimensions, nature and character of Little Green Street ;

• the original opinion of your officers that the use of Little Green Street would be unsafe; or

• the Council’s ownership of non-highway property upon which access to the proposed development depends.

In the circumstances, I hope you will now authorise the comprehensive safety audit you personally promised. I see no reason why the Council should shy away from this. To re-confirm, following an extensive safety audit, the Council’s original conclusion that there is no safe access would be no embarrassment. It would vindicate the original refusal and expose the fact that the Planning Inspectorate in overturning the Council’s decision did not fully consider all the practical consequences of their decision.