This year’s Betjeman Lecture will take place online on Thursday 30 September at 7.30pm.

Norman Shaw, one of the most prominent and influential architects of his time, was appointed Estate Architect of Bedford Park in 1877 in the early stages of the development of its unique character. His designs — including houses, St Michael and All Angels Church and the Tabard Inn — set the tone for the estate, recognised internationally for its architectural importance.

The lecture will look at Bedford Park’s importance as a chapter in the Victorian house design revolution. Rather than offering a jumble of designs for individual houses, its architects felt their way towards an overall aesthetic for the world’s first garden suburb, which publicised itself as a Utopia for those of modest funds. 

Norman Shaw’s influence was crucial. As the designer of St Michael and All Angels Church, the Tabard Inn and Stores and several balconied and gabled houses, he set a standard for Bedford Park, which was followed by its later architects, as well as inspiring Hampstead Garden Suburb. 

Our speaker, Nicholas Friend, MA (Oxon) MA (Cantab) FRSA, will explore Shaw’s work at Bedford Park in the context of his antecedents and his early dramatic houses, looking particularly at how Bedford Park’s borrowings from earlier English architecture function to please the eye, as well as representing both late Victorian and modern ways of life. 

You can read more about Nicholas below.

The talk including questions will last approximately an hour.

TO BUY TICKETS:

Tickets are £10 (plus booking fee) available online.

You will receive confirmation of the arrangements for watching the talk (via Zoom) when you reserve your ticket. 

This is an open event and everyone is welcome to buy tickets. 

Nicholas Friend MA (Oxon) MA (Cantab) FRSA

After working as Staff Tutor in art history for the extra-mural department of Cambridge University, Nicholas Friend was appointed Founder-Director of the Cambridge University Art History Summer School and continued in that post for 25 years.

Since 1986 he has also been Founder-Director of Inscape, the art history study tour society, which has taken its members into the active study of buildings and art galleries all over the world from Istanbul to New Mexico.

With Covid’s lockdown of study group travel, he currently gives extensive series of Zoom lectures on architecture, painting and the decorative arts. His interest in Bedford Park coincides with lecturing in late 19c British architecture and design for Sotheby’s Institute and elsewhere, together with his membership of the Victorian Society and William Morris Society. He chaired the latter Society’s Committee to celebrate the centenary of William Morris’ ‘News From Nowhere.’  He is an active Companion of Ruskin’s Guild of St George. 

Experimental traffic schemes

The temporary road closures affecting Chiswick and Bedford Park continue to provoke very mixed reactions from pedestrians, cyclists, motorists and local businesses. The changes included the trial road closures of Turnham Green Terrace, Devonshire Road and Fisher’s Lane; restriction on motor vehicles entering Duke Road from the High Road and road closures at the junctions of Wellesley Road and Stile Hall Gardens with the South Circular (A205).

We remain committed to working on behalf of the Society’s members and local residents to try to ensure a positive outcome from the trials, which would ideally provide improved access to Chiswick High Road, Turnham Green Terrace and Devonshire Road for cyclists and pedestrians, while at the same time minimising — to the greatest extent possible —  any adverse effect on the free flow of public transport, and commercial and private vehicles in the area.

We are concentrating our efforts on ensuring that any permanent proposals that emerge from the current temporary schemes provide for an appropriate balance of interests amongst all road users — pedestrians, cyclists, motorists and local businesses. To this end, we are building on the effective lines of communication we have established with local councillors to encourage them to work together to propose a constructive way forward for Ealing and Hounslow. We are also attempting to establish what criteria the councils are planning to use as a test for the success of the measures currently being trialled to ensure all stakeholder interests are represented, in particular those of local residents. 

Information on Hounslow’s Streetscape programme can be found on the Hounslow website.

Turnham Green Terrace and Devonshire Road reopened

When Thames Water extended their emergency works on Acton Lane into late November 2020, Hounslow Council suspended access restrictions for Turnham Green Terrace and it has now been announced that this will continue. Enforcement of the restrictions and issuing of PCNs ceased and parking is once again permitted within the guidelines displayed.

Hounslow Council announced in July that Devonshire Road would re-open to through traffic from 8.00am to 5.00pm daily by the end of July. This follows consultation with residents and local businesses with the latter saying that they preferred a partial restriction of traffic, which would allow continued use of some parking space for outdoor dining.

Improving the Terrace

A report, prepared by leading transport engineers Urban Movement, suggested a range of improvements for Turnham Green Terrace — including a piazza outside Turnham Green Tube Station, more zebra crossings, public spaces and widened pavements, whilst retaining some parking, as well as through traffic.
 
The proposals are the result of a community workshop organised by group of local architects and planners. You can read the press release and full report here.  

Any comments received were included in the submission of the group’s recommendations to Hounslow Council.

Fisher’s Lane remains closed

Ealing Council have implemented the temporary closure of the Fisher’s Lane underpass to all traffic except buses, cycles and emergency vehicles.

Ealing Council consider it to be part of a strategic cycle route, intended eventually to link East Acton to Chiswick and to Cycleway 9 on the High Road. The Council have announced that the trial will be continuing until September.  

The councils stated that a number of these changes are being introduced as Experimental Traffic Orders (therefore not requiring consultation) and that feedback will be reviewed to determine whether they should be continued beyond the trial period. If the councils decide to take any of the schemes forward on a permanent basis, they will have to launch a formal consultation at that point and residents will have an opportunity to make their views known.

Hounslow Council have announced that following the completion of an interim (3-4 months) and a final (7-8 months) review by an independent consultant into the temporary traffic schemes, all Hounslow residents will receive notification of a link to the reports. 

Feedback will be accepted up to the end of the trial and residents asked for final comments on the schemes in early January.

It’s important to continue to make your views known directly to the relevant local authority:

• To provide feedback on the Hounslow schemes, you should complete the consultation feedback form and/or email: traffic@hounslow.gov.uk   
• For further information or to make comments on the Fisher’s Lane scheme, email: COVIDtransport@ealing.gov.uk

We’ve also been asked to let you know about a local initiative — a petition organised by a resident who is concerned about a number of issues relating to the road closures. You can find details here.

Temporary Cycleway

A temporary version of the Cycleway 9 affecting the way traffic is managed between the junctions with Heathfield Terrace and Goldhawk Road is in operation.

Unlike the original plans for the segregated cycleway, there is no use of pavement space or removal of trees but the designs introduce a bi-directional cycle lane taking over existing bus lanes and restricting motor traffic to a single lane each way for much of the length of Chiswick High Road.

In addition to traffic congestion during the building of the cycle lane, there have been many comments made about the temporary scheme, including some concerns about potential safety issues for both cyclists and pedestrians, such as the complicated junctions, revised zebra crossings and bus stops, and changes to the way vehicles enter/exit side roads.

Transport for London (TfL) has stated that it remains committed to continue with the trial operation of Cycleway 9 although some changes are planned to the way the route operates and a consultation is to be held into the changes being proposed, as well as the long-term future of the scheme..

Figures released by TfL and Hounslow Council in July, which they say shows that Cycleway 9 has been a success are being strongly disputed by opponents of the scheme. You can read more on ChiswickW4.com.

Hounslow has asked for continued feedback from residents on the project.

To submit your views, including raising any safety concerns:

• Hounslow: complete the feedback form and 
• Transport for London: email streetspacelondon@tfl.gov.uk or haveyoursay@tfl.gov.uk 

The closing date for the Department for Transport’s Part 2 consultation on night time flights has been extended from 31 May to September 2021. This follows requests for more time for respondents to incorporate additional evidence, in particular the results of a Survey of Noise Attitudes for Night, expected to be available within the next three months.

As a result, if you haven’t already submitted your comments, we suggest that you might want to wait until we can update the guidance later this year. 

The consultation covers night flights restrictions at Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports beyond 2024, plus national night flight policy. The findings from this consultation will be used to inform policy options as the basis of firm proposals for the designated airports beyond 2024 — to be included in a consultation planned for 2022.

While this process relates to the designated airports in their current operational form and does not consider airport expansion proposals, any easing of night flight restrictions would have a significant effect on Bedford Park and Chiswick residents.

The consultation and many of the questions are complex and technical. We are extremely grateful to have been able to use draft responses prepared by the No 3rd Runway Coalition and HACAN (Heathrow Association for the Control of Airport Noise) to help provide guidance in completing the survey.

You can find information here on the simplest way to respond:

Part 2 suggested responses

Supreme Court overruled verdict on Third Runway

Third Runway threatens everyone in Chiswick

Heathrow’s proposals will cause major disturbance to all Chiswick residents with more flights, more noise and more pollution, possibly even if the Third Runway does not go ahead.

• Heathrow are proposing options that would result in 29 flights directly over Bedford Park and Chiswick between 06.00 and 07.00am – one plane every 2.4 minutes – at very high decibel levels, likely to wake people up. Up to 40 overhead flights per day are proposed at this stage, before implementation of the new runway.
• If the Third Runway is built, we would be even more significantly affected with incoming low-flying aircraft (at 2,000 – 3,000ft), 47 flights per hour (one every 1.5 minutes) and with all of the flights above the key 65-decibel level. There will be 17 departing flights per hour (one every 3.5 minutes), all above 65 decibels. 

Our work to challenge the development

We continue to monitor developments, supporting the work of CHATR (Chiswick Against the Third Runway), keeping in touch with the No Third Runway Coalition, and taking action when necessary. We remain committed to supporting any further efforts to challenge this development, which represents such a significant threat to Bedford Park and Chiswick. 

Many questions are still unanswered, such as safety; reconciliation with air pollution limits; binding Climate Change targets; the economics of the project, including creating access to the airport, and the adequacy of the government’s proposed compensation scheme.

We have continued to encourage members to respond to Heathrow Airport’s Airspace consultations, which will influence its proposals to the CAA for the development of the airspace of Chiswick and Bedford Park. We contacted members, summarising the key points and providing responses that the Society and CHATR suggested should be made to make the strongest case, and also submitted formal responses from the Society. 

We attended a meeting with the Aviation Minister where CHATR emphasised the noise disruption which would be caused by the flight path passing over Chiswick and Bedford Park.

Guidance provided for responding to consultations

We have urged everyone to submit a response to each consultation.

For September 2019, we provided two suggested responses depending on whether you live in Bedford Park or the wider Chiswick area:

• Click here for the responses for Chiswick.

• Click here to find our suggested responses for Bedford Park residents.

We are grateful for input from the No 3rd Runway Coalition in compiling the responses.

The March 2019 consultation

The majority of this consultation was about airspace change, noise, respite, directional preference and night flights, which will follow the construction of the third runway, and full details are available online.

The Society’s response is available here.

Previous consultation in 2018

The Society submitted a formal response and encouraged everyone to submit an individual objection.

The Society’s response is available here.

The original full proposal produced by the Government can be seen online. 

More detailed facts and figures are also available on the No 3rd Runway Coalition’s website.

As well as producing suggested responses and information on how to submit responses for members, we work with CHATR to help publicise the importance of responding to all Chiswick residents.  Our efforts have been appreciated by members and residents alike.