UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 837-xxxv

HOUSE OF COMMONS

MINUTES OF EVIDENCE

taken before the

COMMITTEE

on the

CROSSRAIL BILL

Tuesday 23 May 2006

Before:

Mr Alan Meale, in the Chair

Mr Brian Binley

Mr Philip Hollobone

Kelvin Hopkins

Mrs Siān James

Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger

Mrs Linda Riordan

 

Ordered: that Counsel and Parties be called in.

The Petition of Kempton Court Residents.

The Petitioner appeared in Person.

9020. CHAIRMAN: Today the Committee will hear the Petitions of the Kempton Court Residents and others followed by the Southend Arterial Action Group. Ms Lieven, do you want to outline for the Committee?

9021. MS LIEVEN: Sir, I do not know whether that would be helpful to the Committee. We do have a model outside, so effectively the Committee have a choice: I could briefly outline Whitechapel Station using photos, axonometrics and plans or the Committee could go outside and Mr Berryman could explain the model, or we could start with one and move and on to the other.

9022. CHAIRMAN: I think what we will do is we will nip outside and Mr Berryman can take us through the model and then we will come back in and resume. We will do that now.

After a short break

9023. CHAIRMAN: Ms Lieven, do you want to add anything?

9024. MS LIEVEN: Sir, I think in the light of Mr Berryman's explanation I probably only have to touch on two things. One is Mr Berryman mentioned that our scheme at Fulbourne Street rests on being able to take away two of the District Line lines and widen the platforms. That in turn rests on promoting an additional provision, which we intend to do, and that will be put in in due course. If, for whatever wholly unexpected reason, the additional provision does not go forward, is rejected, which is always a possibility, then there is the fallback of the Cambridge Heath Road Station, which was assessed in the Environmental Statement. The reason I want to say this publicly so that it goes on the transcript is that the Promoter's position is that if AP3 is approved, the additional provision, then we will build the Fulbourne Street ticket hall and not the Cambridge Heath Road ticket hall because the Cambridge Heath Road ticket hall would simply not be justified on pedestrian flows that would then be produced. Sir, I know that Tower Hamlets are concerned about that and I thought it was important to get that point on the record.

9025. The only other point I should touch on now is in relation to the Kempton Court Residents' Association Petition. As the Committee may have been informed through communications in the last couple of days, one of the Kempton Court Residents' Association's principal points is noise impact. Ms Singleton is going to speak to that tonight, as I understand it. We are not intending, unless the Committee strongly wishes us to, to call noise evidence tonight because we wish to go away and have a really good look at the noise projections and all the relevant noise impact in the vicinity of Whitechapel Station and then produce a document which will deal with that matter comprehensively which we can send to Ms Singleton and all the petitioners who raise these points and which we can then present to the Committee. There are a number of different noise sources in that location and it is quite a complicated noise situation. We want to be absolutely certain that the position we present to the Committee and the position we present to petitioners when they appear is entirely accurate and comprehensive. I do not think I can say, hand on heart, we can do that this evening. I hope that is acceptable. We have discussed it with Ms Singleton. I think her position is she wanted to attend this evening so she could present her case to the Committee but I think she is content that we deal with the noise issues in that way.

9026. So far as the other issues are concerned, I have Mr Berryman here and if the Committee wants to hear him on matters such as traffic controls, which I know is another concern of Kempton Court residents, then I have got him ready to give evidence if that is what the Committee wants.

9027. CHAIRMAN: That is helpful. I think your situation on noise is a very apt suggestion and I think that is the way we will go. Ms Singleton, that does not reflect on you, you can make any issue in your submission that you wish to raise.

9028. MS SINGLETON: I can still talk about surface noise?

9029. CHAIRMAN: Anything you want really. Would you like to start?

9030. MS SINGLETON: Chairman, and Members of the Committee, I represent the residents of Durward Street, which is quite a long, slightly different shaped street. I am representing the residents of Kempton Court itself, Trinity Hall, which is a London Board school which was converted nine years ago into residences, the west end side of Durward Street that was built by a housing association, and the Albion Health Centre, which is in the Sainsbury's car park area, abutting on to that.

9031. What we will be having around this area will be four worksites and utilities work. There are around 300 residents in Durward Street who will be impacted by all of this work. I just want to look quickly at the history from the point of view of the residents who are there. Kempton Court was built ten years ago and it has 110 flats. Following on from that Trinity Hall was converted and about four years ago the west side of Durward Street was developed from an empty site. It would be fair to say that when the residents of Kempton Court bought their properties there was no question of Crossrail in sight. We had all heard about the Hackney-Chelsea and east-west railway and so on, but it was not talked as being anywhere near Whitechapel, it was from Stratford to Liverpool Street or somewhere else.

9032. Our first intimation was when we went to the first round of consultation when I discovered that there was going to be a station at Cambridge Heath Road. That is quite a long way from Durward Street. It was impacting but not too worrying. At that time the ventilation shafts were projected to be in Vallance Gardens, which is just behind Durward Street. That did seem rather odd because Vallance Gardens had just had quite a lot of money spent on doing it up.

9033. At the next round we learned there would be a station which would be coming to Court Street on the west side of Durward Street, and that would have a big impact. At the same time the ventilation shafts were being moved to Essex Wharf, much nearer Kempton Court and Trinity Hall.

9034. At the third round of consultation we discovered that, in fact, Fulbourne Street was then going to be the entrance. The first time we learned that Kempton Court would be affected was when the little red brochure was provided that said some of the car parking spaces in Kempton Court had been moved. It is quite recent knowledge that we have had of the possibility of the station being at Whitechapel and the impact that would have on us.

9035. From the pictures you have seen Durward Street looks to be a nice, little modern street but, in fact, it is a very old street and has been on maps for hundreds of years. It was originally Ducking Pond Row and it became Bucks Row. It was changed to Durward Street after a rather unfortunate incident because the first victim of Jack the Ripper was killed in the street. As well as the usual pedestrians this brings the unlikely thing of groups of tourists coming along to see the exact place. In recent times there were tenement buildings that have all been knocked down over the last 12 or 13 years.

9036. I would just like to touch on the consultation. We do feel that we had very poor consultation on the effects of Crossrail. I would just draw your attention to round one which was in a building at Wodeham Gardens where I believe only about 40 people attended. I have a quote from a letter here: "Your two days' exhibition about the Whitechapel Station had no local publicity and was located in an unknown community room on a new housing estate yet to appear in the A-Z, a sure way to ensure nobody comes". As I live in the area and I knew that Wodeham Gardens had been created on this new housing estate I walked all round it and could not find the building. I rang up the council, asked the local school and the leisure centre and nobody could tell me where this community centre was. I chose to walk around it again at the time it was projected to be open and, sure enough, there it was. It is a building with no distinguishing features, nothing that says anything about it being Wodeham Gardens. It is very disappointing that such a place had been selected.

9037. Personally, the people in Kempton Court had not had written information from Crossrail until fairly recently so, consequently, very few people knew about the second round in Sainsbury's car park except that I put up messages, and I found out by accident. I did not get a letter and I am on the list of people to write to.

9038. Round three at Whitechapel Sports Centre was better publicised. There is also a list - I am not sure what it is called - of all the people who have been consulted and when you get to Kempton Court there is just a blank page and it says "Ballymore". Ballymore are the developers. Nobody has been able to explain, although I wrote to Crossrail, why we were not written to at that point. If you ring up a mail order catalogue or anybody else you can always get the list of registered electors, and yet somehow this very important site in the whole development of Crossrail in Whitechapel ----

9039. CHAIRMAN: Ms Singleton, can I just ask you was it only the residents of Kempton Court who had not been notified or was it all residents in that particular area?

9040. MS SINGLETON: It does seem to have varied. I have to say that is not something I have followed up with Trinity Hall and other residents.

9041. CHAIRMAN: What you are saying is that nobody ----

9042. MS SINGLETON: The Albion buildings, where the Albion Health Centre is, their names were on the list so there should not be a reason why ours were not.

9043. CHAIRMAN: That was not my question. You were saying it was all the residents in Kempton Court but were any of the other areas you have mentioned today contacted or not?

9044. MS SINGLETON: I have to say it had not occurred to me to ask that.

9045. CHAIRMAN: So it was only Kempton Court?

9046. MS SINGLETON: Certainly Kempton Court. The most important thing for us is to consider what we are being faced with from our point of view. I am going to go through the things that will be happening on the sites. You have seen the worksites today but I think it needs spelling out what is going to be there.

9047. On the Sainsbury's site there is going to be a shaft 15 metres in diameter where there will be access and removal of spoil. That shaft means that all the works to go down to tunnel out the platforms will be dropped down there, excavating machines and machines for tunnelling, because the Whitechapel platform and station are not going to be tunnelled through with the boring machine but done with small machines. There will be construction and underneath there will be sprayed concrete linings. There will be a concrete batching plant on site, which is quite a big plant. There will be a pile of excavated soil on the surface from everything that is coming up, and hopefully it will be taken away promptly but it will be there. There will be lorries coming in and out to remove that. There will be tunnels to be fitted out once the excavations have been done. Then the shaft itself will be filled in. I have to say, I am not quite sure whether the spoil has to come back for that. The second station entrance and the escalators near Cambridge Heath Road will be built. At some stage the tunnel boring machine will be slid through, it has to go through towards Farringdon. There will obviously be ground machinery: cranes, lorries, fans, compressors, a hoist and all the things like the office and workshop buildings. There will be some 24 hour working, which I believe includes the concrete batching plant. This will be very near the Albion Health Centre and staircases nine to 12 of Kempton Court which have bedrooms facing on to the street and on to Brady Street. Literally the concrete batching plant and wheel washing machine will be just on the other side of that. We are pleased that Crossrail have agreed to turn lorries back that come in there collecting soil but that still means there will be a lot of lorries going through the site.

For the Essex Wharf site, it sounds like it is just a ventilation shaft and escape hatch but the work going on there will be demolishing the caretaker's house, piling along the East London Line on both sides, the demolition of retaining walls, an electricity substation to be removed and rebuilt, excavating on both sides of the East London Line, constructing an escalator and lift shafts then reconstructing the retaining walls and backfilling the hole, constructing the lightwell, landscaping, rebuilding the caretaker's house, and the exit will be opposite staircases two and three of Kempton Court so there will be a lot of lorries moving in and out. Much of the work will be opposite staircase one of Kempton Court.

9048. I should just explain about staircases. In Kempton Court there are 16 staircase entrances and they all have a number of flats per staircase. For instance, staircase one has four, staircase two has one on each side of it, so that is eight flats, and so on.

9049. Of course there will be the machinery of the tower crane, crawler mobile crane, piling machinery plus other things. We will also have traffic which will be doing deliveries to Swanlea School which at the moment would go another way. There will be deliveries to the kitchen.

9050. On the Durward Street site, which is the very big site in front of Trinity Hall and the leisure centre stretching right over the District Line, there will be construction of a large box in front in that area and it will have to be then propped and piled and constructed. There will be a spoil heap there and there will be much demolition. There will be the demolition of the Court Street bridge, Fulbourne Street bridge, Woods Building bridge and a cable bridge. There will be other District Line bridges removed and footbridges will be rebuilt. Fulbourne Street bridge will be rebuilt with the station entrance. There will be a conveyor there, there will be lorry deliveries of reinforcement and steelwork, shotcrete and concrete and the station structure and removal of excavated spoil and demolished works.

9051. On the Kempton Court site, which is smaller and does not take so long, it is fixed to a tiny little street called Winthrop Street. There will be a wall removed from Winthrop Street, there will be oscillatory piling on the East London Line wall. There will be work on the bridges for the main station. There will be vehicle turning, piling machinery and the use of Winthrop Street for lifting operations and this will require the removal of car park spaces and plants and trees in Kempton Court.

9052. On top of these four worksites there will be utilities diversion. They will mainly be on the west side of Durward Street. There will be relocation of electric cables - and this is excavation of trenches, duct laying, backfilling and reinstatement which may take one to three months. Then there will be protection or diversion of a brick sewer. There will be enlarged manhole entry points involving excavation, concreting and chamber construction. Or there will be diversion by tunnelling or diversion and that could take between two and six months. We know the whole of Durward Street has been recently mapped out and checked with radar to see what services and utilities are beneath because there still may, I understand, be other things which may require moving. There will also be the demolition of London Underground staff accommodation.

9053. It is the actual complete breadth of the worksites which is the problem for us. It would not matter at what time during a possible six year period there would be noise and construction going on. If one site is not perhaps being so loud then the next one will be. That is our concern about how we can live with four worksites plus other things going on.

9054. Now I would like to talk, first of all, about the construction hours. In the document that Crossrail sent they proposed that the hours should be from 7am to 7pm. Now it is just intolerable to think that for 12 hours of the day we will have construction work going on. I would say they are in excess of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets' code and the actual construction hours should be 8am to 6pm following that code. We do need an undertaking that the Promoter will undertake and provide assurances to follow the requirements of the London Borough and Tower Hamlets' Code of Construction Practice. Even then we will not always have this because we do understand there will have to be some 24-hour working and late night deliveries when roads are clearer for big items of work.

9055. There will be Saturday morning working and then one might hope for more respite on a Sunday but certainly as far as the Sainsbury's car park worksite is concerned it will be used for maintenance so that means people sleeping in their bedrooms overlooking that site may get very little chance to have a lie-in. We would request no early start then and no noisy work on that Sunday maintenance.

9056. As far as the visual impact is concerned, it will actually be very considerable. There are three metre hoardings proposed around most of the sites but it does seem a very depressing reminder of all work going on on the other side if they are just plain with the logo of Crossrail and the undertaker. I feel it could be a red rag to look at out at those places for years knowing that they have got the noise and the pain of the area. We would like Crossrail to provide visual interest on those hoardings and consult the residents.

9057. I have some suggestions. At the Durward Street site they could put maybe the history of the original street on the hoardings. At the Kempton Court site where we might have trees removed we could have pictures of trees. At Essex Wharf, the origins of the name and the activities that went on there. At Sainsbury's maybe the history of the brewery and the Salvation Army which was started so nearby. There are many building sites across London which do these pictorial graphics now to make places look more interesting. I think it would also prevent any people walking along the street from feeling "Help, this is just one enormous building site".

9058. The other visual point is the escape shaft at Essex Wharf. You saw it out there when Mr Berryman mentioned there is a little silver place there. The Promoter's picture is pretty awful. It does not reflect the area at all, it is like a modern spaceship suddenly dropped down. I think we should be able to have something which reflects the area better and there are precedents for this. For instance in Gibson Square in Islington when London Underground proposed a tall chimney in the middle of their garden square when the Victoria Line was built, they managed to get a top architect to design a Grecian temple which fitted in nicely. I would like to think we could have something on that site, which the residents of staircase one have to look out on all the time, which actually is pleasant and reflects the area.

9059. They have also suggested landscaping an open area. Well, that sounds wonderful but those people have not been along Durward Street at 10 o'clock at night or later. Whitechapel is an area where there are a large amount of hostels and an enormous Salvation Army hostel for street drinkers. Any open space attracts street drinkers however hard the neighbourhood police try to prevent that happening. Also open spaces do attract many disaffected teenagers, even our doorsteps are used by people to hang about on and make noise. The idea of an open plaza that is nowhere in particular would be quite disastrous, I think it has to be looked at in another way.

9060. I would like to move on to lorry movements and we know that the bulk of the lorry movements will go along Durward Street from east to west. Lorries with supplies will leave Sainsbury's car park, then will then turn right into Brady Street and then left into Durward Street, that is two turns within a very short distance. It will be very noisy outside flats at the turn in Brady Street which is a narrow street. Those outside staircase 11, the entrances are internal but the bedrooms are on the outside.

9061. I am not clear whether the lorries at Essex Wharf will return via the school and right into Durward Street or whether they will go through the back of the school and down into Durward Street, I am not sure whether that has been totally decided.

9062. There is a great danger of turning right and turning into Durward Street, turning left. It is a very narrow pavement there. The beginning of the staircases are only 4'6" from the road so we will need some traffic management there of build-outs to make sure that lorries do not turn too tightly.

9063. I just feel leaving the end of Durward Street on the west side has not really been mentioned in any way. I think the houses that are down that end, as lorries turn left into Vallance Road might also have quite a lot of problems if over 70 lorries a day drive down to that corner and have to wait for traffic to move into Vallance Road. That could be a very noisy scenario. I know that Crossrail said that in fact it will not be any worse than buses but those of you who have been there will see the buses at the moment turn down Fulbourne Street, they come in Vallance Road but they do not exit from Vallance Road. I think lorries could be a far noisier vehicle than buses.

9064. There will be the kitchen deliveries from the school coming in and out, perhaps that is not many but it is just added noise in Durward Street.

9065. Many of the lorry movements which stop on the west side and the Durward Street worksite would be dropping off and picking up lorries because all the demolished buildings and everything have to go out. I would expect that there would be a lot of noise while that is done.

9066. Now there are varying extrapolations as to the amount of noise and it is quite difficult to trawl through everything with the additional provisions but I understand that at the peak time it would be 80 lorries per day going along Durward Street and there could be 140 lorry movements in Sainsbury's. Some of those would be turn round lorries going back out of the Sainsbury's site and some of those would be out of hours. All these lorry movements will require management of staff to ensure that there are safe pedestrian movements and access for residents of Kempton Court and the West Durward Street site and Trinity Hall. We expect that all this traffic will produce dirt, dust and a degradation of the landscape and, therefore, we would ask for regular checking and, if necessary, wall washing and window washing of buildings in Durward Street to keep them reasonably cared for during this long period of work. There are some trees in Durward Street. They struggle greatly to grow but it would be nice if they were protected.

9067. The other really important thing about Durward Street is it is the only street which runs between Vallance Road and Brady Street for a long period because of the East London Line cut-through. We know the minute the bollards are removed in Durward Street it will become a rat-run and it will be a place for boy racers. We are very concerned about this. If it is not being used for deliveries at night you need to look at a way of having it closed off so that we do not get the nightly rat-runs, and hopefully monitored during the daytime so people do not use it as a cut-through. The reason it would be so popular is if you go down Brady Street to Whitechapel Road you can only turn left, you cannot turn right, so it would make it very attractive to nip through Durward Street instead.

9068. On the question of noise, this is certainly our biggest concern. It is just the all-round effect of noise all the time. There will always be some noise going on. When one looks at the machines, ground-breaking machines, particularly when the shafts are first being dug and the utilities, there will be piling, cranes, tracked excavators, front-end loaders, compressors, generators, excavation going on, large concrete pours, the tunnel ventilation in Sainsbury's car park, the demolition and rebuilding, and spoil unloading and loading on lorries, and these are all things that will create a noise. It is not predictable, as with so many sites, where that noise will move to and create problems for people in Durward Street.

9069. I will look at a couple of examples of unexpected noise which have made me realise this. At the corner of Brady Street and Whitechapel Road there is the new Idea store built by Tower Hamlets. It was opened in September last year and we suddenly heard an enormous noise around Kempton Court and it was very variable at which point it was heard. It sounded like birds fighting, I suppose. It was very loud and very perturbing. Eventually I spent some time tracking it down to the Idea store and I went into the Idea store where you could not hear it at all. I asked to see the manager who was really surprised that we had this terrific noise. It was a new bird scarer. It certainly scared the daylights out of us! Now it has been modified and turned down and it is okay. That is just an example of noise that travels in strange and unexpected directions. At the moment there is another worksite going on, which will be a long, ongoing process, and that is the demolition and rebuilding of the Royal London Hospital. From my flat I can hear very clearly the sound of drilling and demolition and yet I live four streets from where it has just started but it is so clear and it has to pass through the wall of a great post office as well. It is very obvious to me when they are doing jack work or whatever. That is another example. I would not have supposed that noise could come so far so clearly. That is what makes me realise how difficult it might be to look at the amount of noise that will affect all the residents of Durward Street.

9070. The mitigation is that at the moment certain dwellings have been designated as needing noise insulation but the whole of Durward Street should be treated the same. Everybody will need noise insulation. It is very difficult to say where that will be at any one time. Most of us, because we are in modern buildings, do have double glazing so noise insulation might be difficult to install because I understand if you are going to put another lot of insulation in it needs mechanical ventilation otherwise how will you get any air. It might be reasonable to provide compensation for residents so that they might be able to get out of the area occasionally instead, they might think, "We have to put up with the noise, however hideous, but we would like to be able to go down to Brighton for the day" as a sort of quid pro quo.

9071. We would like to be considered as a special area in terms of noise where everyone is equally affected. There are also some people who are designated as requiring temporary re-housing. This has caused a problem because we do not have any certainty as to who these people are in the same way that we do not have any certainty about who the people are at the moment who have been designated as needing noise insulation. This comes about partly because of the way the numbering has been written. On the list of properties likely to qualify for noise insulation only, it has various properties but it is not specific enough to know which they are, which leaves a degree of uncertainty. For instance, it states "the property addresses one to four Kempton Court" but what I think they are really saying is staircases one to four but on staircases one to four there are 28 flats and eight of those would qualify but we do not know which eight flats or why those were chosen. It goes on to 6 Winthrop Street, which is Trinity Hall, the school building, and it just says one flat will qualify. Which one of the 18 flats will qualify? This is the area I would ask Crossrail to work on specifically to make sure we do have some definite information. This is particularly important because this is leading up to blight.

9072. I just want to turn to the Albion Health Centre because they have concerns about noise. This is a big health centre with six doctors and they are planning to expand. It backs on to the Sainsbury's car park site. I do have a letter from them. What they are saying is that it might be a problem if there is noise during consultations when they need a calm atmosphere and yet just over the wall there is an enormous building site. They need Crossrail to look at mitigation measures for that. The GPs are going to take on more procedures, which is the standard thing now that much work should be done in GPs' surgeries rather than hospitals, so that is going to put some pressure on their delivery of that. They already do minor surgery and they need a very clean atmosphere for that, so that may need special insulation provided by Crossrail. They would like close consultations throughout the site works. They do feel that they might need to call for the cessation of work sometimes if they cannot fulfil what they are doing with the patients. That is a very big concern. They are also losing some car parking space permanently but this is essential for doctors who might need to get out quickly. That needs good replacement at a convenient place.

9073. I want to look at pedestrian movements in Durward Street. The route goes to the school, the leisure centre and Sainsbury's. As I said, for drivers it is the only one that goes through to Vallance Road. It is also the only one that people from Spitalfields can use as a street to come through to those facilities. It is a busy street. I did a few brief pedestrian counts looking out of my window. Between 8.35 and 8.45 in the morning walking along Durward Street there were 170 people, that is 170 people in ten minutes. They were not all school children because there were also people going to and from work. On Saturday, walking along Brady Street at the corner of Durward Street, in ten minutes there were 136 people. You might think they were all going to Sainsbury's but they were walking up and down the street and it is very busy. Brady Street has flats further up and access to Bethnal Green overground station. On Wednesday between 8.30 to 8.45 between Durward Street and Whitechapel Road along Brady Street there were 331 people all going along that very narrow road, either to the school, to Sainsbury's or to and from Bethnal Green station. The other one was Durward Street going towards Brady Street on Thursday at 12.45 to 12.55 when there were 64. That was not the peak time, that was not the school children coming out. That was a steady flow of people going to and from that street to businesses or shopping. It is narrow in places and can be hazardous now. I think those who came on the visit today saw the most extraordinary sight of the GCSE pupils coming out and taking up the whole road. That is not only today, the pupils do come out of school - there are over 1,000 pupils - and they are very exuberant. That road is busy but still people choose to belt along it occasionally. Over the East London Line bridge it is very narrow, just two people wide. There is a picture of that. That is of particular concern because on the other side of that facing on to it is Trinity Hall and it has no pavement whatsoever so people must walk along the East London Line bridge. Normally people spill out on to the street because it is not that busy with traffic. If that was being used for lorry movements all day then we would need build-out of that pavement and some means of ensuring safety, but not at the cost of the pedestrians who are already squashed along there.

9074. I would suggest that it would be helpful to have no lorries in the street at school arrival and departure times to account for the fact that if there are 170 children coming along Durward Street in ten minutes why not stop lorry movements from 8.30am to 8.50am so that people can get there safely.

9075. MS LIEVEN: Can I just say, Sir, we have agreed that with the school. We will not be using Durward Street for lorries during those hours. That one is an easy tip.

9076. CHAIRMAN: Thank you.

9077. MS SINGLETON: We would like a person to manage lorry movements, for instance from Essex Wharf to Durward Street, so that we can get access to Kempton Court as well.

9078. The next point I want to raise is purchase of property in case of hardship. This is a very difficult one for us. There was a date of December 2003 at which people were deemed to have known about Crossrail so that effectively means all property which was bought after that, people should know that Crossrail was going to be in the area. Effectively it puts a blight on everybody's property. I appreciate that it is hoped that the Bill will go through and construction will start fairly speedily but nothing is guaranteed. All the time that is happening we will have a blight on the sale of our properties. Kempton Court, originally, the properties were fairly reasonably priced, there are no lifts there. It was first-time buyers and people who wanted to work locally, say in the hospital, who would buy there. People are mobile, if they are first-time buyers they want to move on, they marry, whatever. There is a steady sale of property. Very often it is done internally, people put a notice up on the notice board, they have rented there, they like it, they would like to move in. We do know there are some people who are aware of what might happen and have bought properties but others who are putting their house on the market have had severe difficulties in selling their property.

9079. I would just like to look at two instances. Melanie Goodfellow bought her flat in 1996, so she was the first owner. In May 2000 she says she found she was pregnant and wanted to sell her house to buy a family property. She spruced up the flat, put it on the market with agents Carrington, who are well known local agents, at a price of £243,000 when a recent property had gone for £240,000. This is about the standard price. She received a first offer very quickly but then, in fact, those people could not get a mortgage. The flat went back on the market and she received a second offer just two weeks later for £237,500 but the buyer pulled out abruptly on 11 August after doing some personal research into the impact Crossrail would have on Kempton Court and the surrounding area. Melanie says that the information did not come up in the local search. The buyer had rung up the local planning office and was told that Durward Street would be one of the worst hit roads in the area. She had read the Environmental Impact on the internet and thought that was pretty grim reading.

9080. Then there were no further viewings, Carrington had been sending quite a few people. Carrington - the agents - realised that they would have to mention Crossrail to any potential buyer and this put most off. Eventually she applied for Crossrail to acquire the property but in fact, although she had set in motion the surveyor coming round, another person did make an offer on the property and bought it. I know the person thinks it is not going to be a problem so it is all very much dependent on what information people have. That is one example.

9081. She mentions that it did not come up on the property search and really all that it does say on the land search is is there to be any railway work within 200 metres and indeed it says "Yes, East-West Crossrail, for more information ...". None of the other questions in the land search really apply at this moment to the Crossrail planning application. One could be forgiven for not assuming that much would be happening. It does not ask questions like "Will a big hole be dug in the road?" It does ask if there will be any bridges put up but it does not ask if any bridges are going to be demolished. Some of it is in the questioning of what is in the land search rather than the fact that there is no information. It is beholden on somebody, either a solicitor or the person purchasing, to trawl through Crossrail's website to find out information.

9082. The other person is a man living in Trinity Hall, Henry Morris. He put his property on sale in March this year at the asking price of £215,000 and a purchaser accepted his asking price of £215,000. Now, again, you have seen the building, it is very attractive inside, lots of flats have mezzanine floors and it is a very popular place. As with all the buildings there you can walk into the City for work and of course it attracts people who do work at the hospital as well. The attraction for many people is the fact that it really is only 15 minutes to get to Liverpool Street on foot, and not much more to get any further into the City.

9083. However, when he found out about Crossrail he offered to purchase the property at £25,000 less at £190,000. This is what he says to Mr Morris: "Further to our conversation yesterday please find attached some information on the potential impacts that the Crossrail project will have on the property on Durward Street in the coming years. It is not possible to copy or print from the Crossrail website itself. However I direct you towards the website ...In light of the above potential disruptions to the building and surrounding environment over a number of years we are going to have to reconsider our offer. We consider that the detrimental effects to residents of the construction programme on the doorstep of the property and the potential negative effects on rental income over a lengthy period should be reflected in a reduction in the purchase price. I look forward to discussing these issues with you ..."

9084. One of the things about this is that for the hardship policy to come in you need to have an offer which is 15 per cent below the market price. That offer was not 15 per cent below the market price. That puts him in a difficult position to look at hardship. I think there are so many questions when one is looking at this in terms of Durward Street because for how long will people be in the position. If, in fact, there is more information given out about Crossrail, if Crossrail gets Royal Assent but has not got a start date, that means people would be very dubious about coming along and making an offer. If they made an offer which was only 12 per cent below the asking price, you might even be tempted to say, "Could you not offer me a lower price so I can go back and start off the hardship price?" I think it puts a lot of pressure on estate agents who, when I have asked them, have just said, "It will be good for prices." They are not spelling out the problems that people will have in Durward Street and once they do, once work has begun, and you are sent information about a property, and you go to Durward Street and discover loads of cranes and noise would you make an offer? It would be very doubtful. How would you get a market valuation, say, well into the project that accurately reflects the price of the property. These are areas of great concern to us and it is such a big building site. Effectively - I know I am not young - I might have to suddenly move out because I could not walk up my three flights of stairs. I appreciate there is something which mitigates for that but it is worrying for other people who would not be in the position of a specific hardship point for them.

9085. I would like to say that I think really the street - and I suppose I am talking mainly about Kempton Court and Trinity Hall because they are the older buildings, the other ones in the street were built by a housing association and have either shared ownership, rental or perhaps some outright sales and they have only been there about four years so they are less likely to be moving on - for the street as a whole I think to put the hardship level at 15 per cent below the prices is fairly tough. I would like Crossrail to look carefully at its policy and see if there are any special considerations because of the length and amount of work in the street.

9086. Now there are quite a lot of other worksites going on around Durward Street as well. Very shortly the East London Line will be worked on. It will be closed for about 18 months while track is re-laid and cables are re-laid and that directly affects Trinity Hall and staircase one of Kempton Court because they are on either side of the East London Line. There will definitely be an amount of noise to that.

9087. CHAIRMAN: Can I just say, Ms Singleton, this is not to do with the Crossrail project. It is a separate project which we cannot deal with.

9088. MS SINGLETON: Can I not say how many other worksites there are at the same time?

9089. CHAIRMAN: I think it is true to say that everything involves everything in a particular area and we can stretch matters, as we indeed stretched it a few moments ago on the question of compensation and valuations and the rest of it which you have raised in the evidence, but we have to deal with the Crossrail Bill and the Crossrail project, you cannot traverse into the other things which are happening now. If Crossrail is approved at some time in the future by Parliament and any subsequent works which come along we have to deal with are not unconnected but at this point in time we cannot deal with it.

9090. MS SINGLETON: I want to turn to the health and general wellbeing of the residents. I am not aware that a Health Impact Assessment has been done for this particular area and the various sites and the impact on people of Durward Street. Sir, if it has not I would ask if it could be produced and the results acted on. It is very difficult to see how people will remain well and cope with so much work about. It is very important to have that information in mitigation. There is an information leaflet produced by Crossrail, leaflet F3, on community relations. It sets out how the undertakers should work with the residents but it is not a statutory document, it is just an information leaflet. I would imagine that although Crossrail would want everybody to work to their requirements, they might very well not do. I am wondering if there is any way of making this a more statutory document so they are required to follow their own procedures for community relations.

9091. There are problems with car parking spaces. In Kempton Court all of the car parking spaces that will be used for the Kempton Court works have been purchased by residents, they all have their own allocated spaces, so this does mean they need some compensation for the use of them and also secure parking elsewhere. That car parking would need to be somewhere nearby and in a safe place for people to walk back to at night. There are quite a lot of night workers who leave at four in the afternoon and come in very late at night.

9092. Certainly if you look at Kempton Court, which you have seen today, we have managed to somehow make the trees grow although there is very poor soil underneath. They have finally started growing and we do have a very nice internal courtyard and plainly it is going to be disrupted by the work and some of the trees removed. We are not clear where this will be and which trees. We are very keen, if possible, to preserve all the trees and if they are removed that we have trees of the same height and type because this is as a whole. We do also have a small garden behind the trees and we would be very upset to lose this site. It is the sunniest spot and it is the only private spot where residents can go. I did feel a bit miffed when I read that the shrubbery was of no particular importance, but it is important to us. It may not be special shrubbery but it does harbour a tremendous amount of bird life and that is the joy of living in Kempton Court now, we have managed to create a haven in what is an area where there is not a lot of greenery about. We are very reluctant to see that disappear. Particularly the robinia tree, the tall one, we would wish to support that. It did blow down once and we managed to get it back up and it has kept growing, so we do not want to see that go.

9093. I would like reinstatement of the site directly after the site has been vacated. It would be a pity if we had to wait a long time before it was reinstated. We do feel that the residents should get some compensation for all the disruption within this site. We would like some compensation and I am suggesting in the street there are three car parking spaces which were created by the developer for visitors to Durward Street which are just used by anybody and never used at night because of the vulnerable place and if the developers were to give us, say, a brick wall there which would incorporate them into Durward and Kempton Court that would be very good compensation. I am not saying we would use them as car parking spaces, that might be difficult, but at least they would be taken into the building. They are not usable at the moment really. At Albion Health Centre some car parking space is going to be permanently lost, so they need some way of accessing their cars easily in another spot. There is loss of residents' and business permit car parking spaces on the west side of Durward Street. I do not even have a car but it is really important that everybody who has a car needs to have somewhere to park. There will have to be a real effort made to see that there are car parking spaces made available afterward.

9094. Lastly, I want to talk about the station at Whitechapel. The original entrance will be an entrance now. To my mind this is the glue of the Whitechapel Market and the area. It is very central; it is only a short walk to the Idea store and across the road to the hospital. It has been proposed that it will be closed but I would request that it remain open even if access to the East London Line is slightly more difficult. I say that because if you are in that area and come up to the Idea store and want to go back, say, to Aldgate East or Brick Lane, if you can access the East London Line from that entrance you have only got to do a bit of nipping down and when you get down to Aldgate East you come directly up to the entrance to Brick Lane. Otherwise, effectively you have to walk the whole 245 metre length away from the East London Line to enter into Fulbourne Street to come all the way back. I did a walk the other day and it is 324 steps at a leisurely pace from the station all the way up to Fulbourne Street. I think that is quite a long way if you are contemplating carrying a few shopping bags. If it was left open on the same basis as at Aldgate East there are two station entrances, one is ticket only facilities, that would be very reasonable because most people living locally would have a ticket. I feel it is important to look at the local needs. Okay, it may regenerate the area and it may be a big station and be wonderful but if it makes life more difficult for local residents by having to go all the way up to Fulbourne Street then can it be said to be of value to local people.

9095. Finally, I would like to say after six years or so of working in Durward Street I feel that we will have a shiny new station but what else will we have had except six years of enormous hassle. I would like to see Crossrail providing some enhancement or facility locally for Durward Street to provide compensation for years of distress. Thank you.

9096. CHAIRMAN: Thank you. Ms Lieven?

9097. MS LIEVEN: Sir, I was planning to call Mr Berryman to deal principally with the traffic issues but I am conscious of the time and there is another petitioner to follow. I do not know whether the most helpful course would be for me to give a brief response to those issues raised by Ms Singleton.

9098. CHAIRMAN: There are quite a lot of them.

9099. MS LIEVEN: There are quite a lot of them but I can probably go through some of them quite quickly. A lot of them, such as the details on traffic routes, we will come back to with the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and possibly with Swanlea School tomorrow. Perhaps if I gave a fairly brief overview response on the points that we can respond to now and pick the other ones up, such as traffic routes, when Mr Berryman gives evidence tomorrow. I am in your hands, sir.

9100. CHAIRMAN: I think it would be helpful. In terms of the noise issue, I have got to say that I am a bit unhappy about this because it has been a key component of the petition and clearly the Promoter has not yet concluded that document, which you referred to before we set out. I want to leave the issue of noise in this petition for when we have that document. I want to deal with that in that way. We will deal with that at a later point, although the evidence has been given and taken. It will give them a chance to view the work of the Promoter and respond back.

9101. MS LIEVEN: Yes, sir.

9102. CHAIRMAN: If you can take us in the interim through the myriad of issues which have been raised then we can deal with those now.

9103. MS LIEVEN: Sir, I will try and do so. If there is anything the Committee needs clarification on in these unusual circumstances they can stop me and ask me a question and I will try to get the answer.

9104. So far as the scale of the construction works is concerned, it is only fair to say that Ms Singleton had a pretty accurate description of what is going to happen at this station. I do not need to go back through that, she had the right worksites and very much the right kind of work. We will come back to that with Swanlea School.

9105. So far as her concern about the lorry routes, particularly on Durward Street, I can give the Committee comfort in at least two respects. So far as school opening and closing hours are concerned, we are giving a commitment to Swanlea School that Durward Street will not be used for construction traffic during the period that the school opens in the morning and closes in the afternoon. It is of particular concern in the afternoon. In the morning a lot of the pupils go in through Brady Street but in the afternoon they come out in Durward Street, so for something like half an hour in the morning and afternoon there will be no construction traffic on Durward Street.

9106. So far as the concern about rat-running down Durward Street is concerned, which is one that we are very conscious of because at the moment there is no access out of Durward Street so it cannot be used as a rat-run but with our proposals it will be open to construction traffic at both ends, we are committing to develop a solution with Tower Hamlets as to how to prevent rat-running. It might be done in different ways. It might be done by having a banksman at the junction just stopping traffic coming in other than construction traffic or residents' traffic, or it might be done by some more automatic method. We are committed to ensuring that there is no rat-running.

9107. So far as pedestrian use of Durward Street is concerned, the Committee may remember Ms Singleton's photo of the relatively narrow pavements. Our current assessments indicate that there will be sufficient capacity on that pavement but we are discussing that with Tower Hamlets. If Tower Hamlets believe that the pavement needs to be widened then that is the type of work that can be done relatively easily. We have got the issue in mind and we are discussing it with the local authority.

9108. So far as the visual impact is concerned, we have no problem in committing to providing screens of visual interest on the hoardings; the precise terms probably to be discussed again with Tower Hamlets and potentially with local residents' groups. That is not an issue.

9109. MR BINLEY: Can I stop you there. You said "potentially" with local residents, surely it is very easy to say, "We will discuss it with local residents"?

9110. MS LIEVEN: The only reason I was not going to say that in those terms is one then has to define local residents. Certainly I can say we will discuss them with local residents and we will define that later.

9111. CHAIRMAN: That possibly will involve the school also.

9112. MS LIEVEN: And the school, sir. The school might paint them, Mr Mould points out, although I think such things are somewhat out of fashion these days. The Durward Street shaft's visual appearance will be subject to Schedule 7 of the Bill and Tower Hamlets will be fully consulted on the detailed design. The design and external appearance of the shaft is subject ultimately to Tower Hamlets' control. I should say it has been chosen as a modern design in our illustrative material because it is next to Swanlea School, which as the Committee saw this morning has a modern design, but if at the end of the day Tower Hamlets want a gothic folly then it is up to them to have a gothic folly.

9113. Dust is subject to statutory control by Tower Hamlets and approval of dust suppression methods is required from Tower Hamlets and that is dealt with under the Code of Construction Practice as the Committee has already heard. There will be appropriate dust control measures. As a particular point on this, in terms of the Albion Health Centre, they are a special user and if special measures are required for dust suppression then those will be given. The Committee may remember, although I must say it starts to recede into the distant past, Smithfield Market and a concern there about dust. We would take the same kind of approach to a health centre, which is special measures for a special user in effect.

9114. We are going to come back to noise but if I could just say that it is precisely issues around the lack of certainty of the number of properties, as an example, which is why we want to do more work and be able to give a more comprehensive answer. I will not say any more about that. Perhaps I should say one thing just to explain some of the problems that have arisen. The Committee will have gathered that Whitechapel Station is an aspect of the scheme that has been under very intensive discussion over the last 18 months and the scheme has changed. It changed just before the ES and it has changed since. That is part of the reason for the lack of clarity as to which properties are affected. We will come back to that.

9115. CHAIRMAN: I understand that we will come back to that but the Committee really does find it unacceptable that people will be living and in and around areas of their flats or buildings or whatever there will be some opinion that certain flats will be taken and others will not, and not even the people in them have had notification of whether they are going to be or not. What we do need at the very least, whilst these things are negotiated or continuing, is people need to be calmed about this issue and perhaps enlightened and have it discussed with a little bit more clarity about what is going on. It is causing disquiet amongst the Committee and I think we all well understand that.

9116. MS LIEVEN: Sir, we completely understand that point and are totally sympathetic to it.

9117. MR BINLEY: Before you go on, my apologies but there is this point about consultation, accuracy of. It seems to me that you have done little monitoring on how good your consultation was. This is a real failing in many areas of public work and public service, particularly in local government. I really do think you have to do a lot more in future and that you ought to take note that you need to monitor your consultation and find out how effective it has been. Very often you can throw out 200,000 leaflets and when you check up so few people have recognised them for what they are and acted upon them that consultation has been a waste of time. I would urge you to look at this over the coming weeks.

9118. MS LIEVEN: With respect, I entirely agree.

9119. MR BINLEY: Thank you.

9120. MS LIEVEN: I should say that the locations for the consultation meetings were chosen after discussion with the local authority so it may have been a lack of local knowledge on all sides. I cannot answer at this stage whether Kempton Court was dropped out of one stage of consultation or not. We have to go back to the computer database. If there is anything of any importance on that which I can inform the Committee on later we will do so. I do not want to give an answer on the hoof.

9121. Hardship is an issue that Ms Singleton raised in some detail. The Committee will remember in particular from the Brentwood Petitioners, where we discussed the hardship policy in considerable detail, that there is a hardship policy which appears at C8 of the information papers. A small factual correction is that I believe the full knowledge date was October 2004, so a little later than Ms Singleton was referring to. The other point is, of course, as the Committee will remember, take the example of Miss Goodfellow who wanted to buy a new place because she was pregnant and she wanted somewhere bigger for her family, if that is the situation and there is a diminution in value of 15 per cent then they would be eligible for the hardship policy. Equally it is important to remember if - one hopes it does not happen - residents of Kempton Court need to move because of ill-health, a disability means they could not get to the second floor or something like that, then again that is covered by the hardship policy. It is precisely those circumstances which are covered. I suspect, having been through that in some detail in the past, we do not need to go through it again.

9122. Health impact, the Committee will recall there has been a Health Impact Assessment on this scheme so those matters have been taken into account.

9123. Community relations are dealt with in information paper F3. That is a policy of the Secretary of State so it is a commitment that we will do the things in that paper.

9124. Car parking. We believe there is definitely a temporary loss of four spaces in Kempton Court and there may be a shorter loss of another four. That will depend on detailed design. We understand from discussions with the caretaker that it would be possible to re-provide those within Kempton Court itself by reconfiguring the car parking space to make a more efficient use. If there are individual owners of the spaces and that is not possible then they will be compensated. We will at the detailed design stage look in detail as to whether, if they cannot be re-provided within Kempton Court, there is somewhere else where they can be re-provided. At this stage we cannot make that commitment but, as I say, we think they could be slotted into Kempton Court.

9125. Trees: the Committee will remember the photographs, there are no significant trees to be removed at Kempton Court. If there are any trees removed, they will not be the big ones but if any small trees have to be removed then they will be replaced by trees of equivalent size, nature and whatever.

9126. The garden: I am afraid this is one where it perhaps got a little bit caught up in what I describe as Environmental Statement speak about "no significant interest". The garden will not be removed under the current scheme. Whatever was in the original ES, I am told the garden will not be removed. That is an unequivocal undertaking.

9127. Compensation: Ms Singleton mentioned three spaces and moving a wall. I am afraid we are not totally sure where that is so I think rather than me responding we had better go away and check that one out, if I may.

9128. As for her final point on enhancement, it is important to remember that although there is no doubt at all that these residents will suffer disturbance over a number of years, at the end of the day there will be a very significant enhancement to this area by the provision of Crossrail and a new station. It is an important point to weigh in the balance so far as the long-term enhancement is concerned.

9129. I think those are the points that I am in a position to respond to.

9130. (After taking instructions) Mr Mould reminds me of a point that I should touch on, keeping the existing station open. Our position now is, and we have written to Tower Hamlets in these terms, that we will undertake to keep the existing station open but it will not be open for ticket selling facilities, that is the current position. Obviously it is LUL's ticket hall and ultimately it is up to them but the current position is we will keep it open but as an exit and entry point only. We will not do any works to upgrade it, because the Committee will remember it is a bit of a difficult station at the moment, up and down and round. What we would propose is that we leave it very much as a secondary entrance and the principal entrance - and we will go through this in much more detail when we come to Tower Hamlets - will be on Fulbourne Street which is of course fully accessible and a completely modern, completely person with restricted mobility accessible station. I have not taken the Committee through that today but there are lifts to every floor and every interchange from Fulbourne Street.

9131. CHAIRMAN: Right.

9132. MR BINLEY: The point about the Tower Hamlets' noise and vibration policy was raised, a local policy, and that suggested that work should take place in what is a very protracted time for these people from 8am to 6pm as opposed to from 7am to 7pm and to look at noisy working on Sundays. You have not mentioned that at all.

9133. MS LIEVEN: No. Sir, I was not going to mention any noise issues because I was going to come back to them but, as you have raised it, can I say on working hours Westminster City Council are taking the lead. It is obviously important that there be some uniform approach across the scheme for reasons of equity. There are residents elsewhere on the scheme who are seriously affected. Westminster are leading and we are in detailed discussions with them and with the planning forum about working hours and that is a matter that we are going to come back to when Westminster appear. If Tower Hamlets have separate issues on working hours then doubtless they will deal with then. Of course when Westminster appear there may be more site specific issues which have to be raised. I would rather deal with it as a totality when Westminster appear because it needs to be dealt with in that way.

9134. MR BINLEY: I understand that. As long as you give us an undertaking that you will remind us because we do not want it to be forgotten.

9135. MS LIEVEN: There is absolutely no possibility that the issue of working hours will be forgotten. If I do not remind you of that I can promise you Westminster will.

9136. Sir, I hope that is sufficient at this stage as a brief response and some of those points we will come back to but we will come back to any of the ones I put to one side in writing to Ms Singleton in any event.

9137. CHAIRMAN: On the noise, Ms Singleton, you will have a chance to read what is undertaken on the noise issue alone to come back to us on that. Are there any other points that you would like to add in response?

9138. MS SINGLETON: No.

9139. CHAIRMAN: You are happy?

9140. MS SINGLETON: I will accept that at the moment, yes, and look for the noise response.

9141. CHAIRMAN: Thank you for your very full and detailed contribution. We will now move on unless, Ms Lieven, you want to add anything?

9142. MS LIEVEN: No, Sir.

9143. CHAIRMAN: Thank you for your presentation. We will now move on to the second petitioner which is the Southend Arterial Road Action Group.

 

The Petition of Southend Arterial Road Action Group.

 

The Petitioners appeared in person.

9144. CHAIRMAN: Would you like to outline the petition for us, Mr Mould?

9145. MR MOULD: Yes. The Petitioners are residents of houses which are alongside these properties here (Indicating) which are alongside a cul-de-sac which itself lies alongside the Southend Arterial route which is this strategic road which you see here running in a north-south direction across here, the Eastern mainline.

9146. Crossrail is proposing to carry out works to extend and modernise existing sidings at Gidea Park. I wonder if we can put up, please, photograph number six which I am going to come to in a minute. The sidings are to the London side of the area here. We will come to the photograph in a minute and the proposal is that we will provide road access to the worksite for the extension of the sidings at Gidea Park along Hall Road which is to be constructed along this line. This is the area of the existing sidings at Gidea Park, just to the north of the eastern mainline. The sidings are to be extended so that they embrace this area here and will provide adequate stabling facilities for Crossrail trains.

9147. The works to the sidings involve modernisation of the tracks and sidings here and some engineering works to extend a cutting and provide attaining walls along this area here for that purpose. The majority of the railway works in this area will be served by rail and that will include the rails themselves, the ballast and other supplies of that kind. However, ready mix concrete will need to be brought in by road and the proposal is that concrete mixers should gain access from the arterial road, which you can see running here, we are looking in an easterly direction, which will gain access via Hall Road which will be served for part of its length by the cul-de-sac that I showed you a few moments ago. The concern of the residents, put shortly, is with concrete lorries and other smaller construction traffic that will be using that Hall Road route and going past those houses on the cul-de-sac during the 20 month or so period of the construction phase.

9148. Very briefly, just to give you a little bit more information before I hand over to Mrs Kemp, it is a 20 month construction phase and the peak period of that is about three months and during that peak period we are expecting about 12 concrete lorries a day along the Hall Road. Outside the peak period, so for the remaining 17 months, we are expecting about four concrete lorries a day and there will be other smaller vans and vehicles of that kind which will be passing along the Hall Road on a daily basis from time to time to serve the works.

9149. The only other point to make, just so that you are completely in the picture, is there will be some items of very heavy plant and machinery which we will need to transport to a point just to the north of the over-bridge where they can be offloaded and brought along the Hall Road on to the site. They will not pass along the cul-de-sac, they will pass from a marked-off lane on the Arterial Road itself over the verge and on to the Hall Road and we expect that to be a relatively infrequent occurrence, as few as two inward deliveries and two outward deliveries as the reasonable minimum that we can expect. As you will expect with coning off a lane on a busy road on a temporary basis for up to a day, we hope somewhat less, that will be dealt with in close consultation with the police and with the highway authorities. We would expect to give proper prior notice to the residents themselves on those few occasions when that would need to be done so they know what is going to happen and they can prepare themselves for that. I am afraid that is a somewhat rushed introduction to this Petition but I hope that gives some sense of where we are in relation to this.

9150. CHAIRMAN: You are all petitioners, are you not, and you can all speak.

9151. MS KEMP: Yes. I am afraid I have not got a lot of voice.

9152. CHAIRMAN: Can I start by saying do not be nervous and, if you are, so are we.

9153. MS KEMP: It is not nerves, I have got a thyroid problem.

9154. CHAIRMAN: As long as you speak loudly enough, and if you do not we will ask you to speak up a bit.

9155. MS KEMP: My voice tends to disappear as I am talking.

9156. CHAIRMAN: As I say, do not worry, just take your time, but not too much time because I am going to ask for your indulgence and your help. We have got 17 minutes before the Committee is supposed to rise and we can only expect the stenographers to stay on for ten or 15 minutes beyond that otherwise we cannot get the evidence printed for the following day. I just need to know how long you think you are going to take either individually or collectively.

9157. MS KEMP: I will be as succinct as I can.

9158. CHAIRMAN: I just want you to be aware of the time.

9159. MS KEMP: Compared to the last area we are quite small so we should be able to be fairly succinct on this.

9160. CHAIRMAN: Okay. If you would like to start now.

9161. MS KEMP: Okay. I do not know if you are able to do a close-up on this picture on the screen of the cul-de-sac itself because that would be helpful. As you can see, coming along the 127, that is purely an access road for us. It is very well screened. It is a very tight bend to get into it. You have traffic lights below the railway line, which is low on the picture, and when the traffic leaves, and we worked out roughly 1,500 an hour pass on that side of the road only, by the time where you see the first piece of writing they are hitting 40mph. As we come down that road, and we have to turn in because they do not know it is there, there is another road just past that, it is very dangerous for us to turn in.

9162. Our main problem with what Crossrail want to do is bringing large lorries in. We did persuade them that they could not get low-loaders in there because we have trouble getting our own cars round that corner. We are now dealing with concrete mixers and they are widening the gap but, as you can see, it is a hairpin bend and as you come round it you have to be careful of cars coming up the road. It is a tiny road. It is purely for residents. To narrow the hairpin to get a concrete mixer round there, we do have a man here who is a lorry driver and very experienced on those and he can tell you about that. We are tiny but it is the impact on us because we have got nowhere to go, it is the only way in. We cannot park while they are doing it. They have suggested we can but that will be an impossibility. We have roughly 28 cars down that street, which is 18 houses. We are struggling to park at the moment and when visitors come in. Widening the entrance, widening the road, is not going to make an awful lot of difference. With concrete mixers coming past there is going to be very little room to get through. Although I know Crossrail is going to contradict us, we have done the measurements. Some people have got pretty good cars down there and with 12 cement mixers coming in and out with a very short space between parked cars and those going past, nobody is happy. If I could ask Frank to speak about the lorries, he will be able to tell you about that and then we can sum up the other aspects.

9163. MR LUNNON: With the way you come in, even our dustcart cannot turn that way, they have to reverse him up the Arterial and then into our bit. Naturally a dustcart does not weigh as much as a concrete lorry and where our houses are it was an old pond and weed bed sort of thing so the ground there is very soft anyway, even the dustcart churns it up a bit on the tarmac. You are talking about bigger lorries trying to come in there. The ground is just not going to take it anyway.

9164. The turning circle on a cement mixer, kerb to kerb, is roughly about 26/27 feet, that is standing kerb turning circle but not motional turning. If he is coming down the Arterial and he has got to come in, he cannot turn the wheel that quick to come round but it is kerb to kerb. With a cement mixer the drum is rotating round, if it tried to take it in too quick it would be on its side. That is roughly all I can tell you. As they say, they are trying to cut off to make the entrance wider but at the same time they are making it so it is more of a hairpin turn to get a lorry in there.

9165. CHAIRMAN: Thank you.

9166. MS KEMP: The actual aspects of the safety part of that is that at 40 miles an hour the cars come in behind you --- When we are coming over the bridge which is quite a way before our entrance we have to start braking and indicating. Even last week one of the visitors to our road was trying to get in but the person behind them was so tight and not slowing down that as they took the bend they went straight through across the road and into the trees and bushes. If this is a concrete mixer with traffic coming up behind it, the main part of it, it is not just the speed as you come over the bridge you are blind to what is going on on the other side. You cannot see that on there. Where it says the Arterial Road that is the end of the bridge. That is sloping down there so as traffic comes over the bridge you cannot see. There is a turning there so if a concrete mixer is slowing down almost to a stop, with the amount of traffic behind it and the speed, we are very conscious of dangerous pile-ups there on that aspect.

9167. If I could pass you on because I really have lost my voice.

9168. CHAIRMAN: Mr Lunnon, it is a made-up road?

9169. MR LUNNON: Pardon?

9170. CHAIRMAN: It is fully made-up. It is an adapted road?

9171. MS KEMP: No, it is not.

9172. MR LUNNON: It is only partly made up of concrete, partly of tarmac.

9173. CHAIRMAN: It is not a fully adapted road?

9174. MR LUNNON: It is not a fully adapted road, not to take heavy vehicles of that calibre. We had a chat to Crossrail and they said they were going to dig it out and make it more secure and put a better road surface in there. As I say, where are we going to park our cars while they are doing that? They will need a 360 machine in there to load up, eight-wheel tippers which are 32 tonnes.

9175. MS KEMP: Could we show you this? You have not seen the road yet. You can see the difference. If you look at the original entrance to it before it was widened, the original entrance to this is where you have the line coming up the Arterial and turning in, the outside edge of that - it is very difficult to show it on that, it is easier on here - is the original entrance.

9176. MR PINK: Where it says "Existing kerb line".

9177. MS KEMP: Yes. The hairpin bend on there is much tighter and we have trouble negotiating a normal car round the bend as it is now. We have to hit that corner to start turning on that kerb. At 20 miles an hour is the first time we can start to turn because you have a 40 mile an hour set of traffic behind you. You have to hit the brakes as you go around that corner to get round. The next diagram is a concrete mixer going round there very neatly.

9178. We live there and we know the dangers of that round and we know the dangers of the traffic coming along behind on the Arterial. We were comparing how busy the road was to a small road leading up to the station. 1,500 cars per hour go past that entrance, not every hour of the day but the majority that is, most of the day. It is difficult for us to get out. We can sometimes sit there for ten minutes before we can get out in traffic. Now you know what we are talking about I will pass you over to Ray Pink.

9179. MR PINK: In view of the time I will try and be fairly brief. Background to what we are discussing here is the residents of the cul-de-sac of Southend Arterial Road had a meeting with Crossrail on 10 March 2005, 14 months ago, soon after we first learned of the impact of what they are now trying to do.

9180. At this meeting the residents raised a number of objections. It was here in a room in the House of Commons. A summary of those objections formed a petition six months later which you will have seen and which has been responded to by Crossrail six months on again in March of this year. Those core objections are effectively what we are looking at and in many cases we really do not think there have been satisfactory answers from Crossrail.

9181. At that first meeting there were three alternative proposals suggested, two of them different road layouts relating to access near the cul-de-sac and one which was to use an existing road on the other side of the railway to effectively have a level crossing. That diagram shows the long diagonal line up the centre going north and north-west up the Arterial Road and you can see at the top of the picture the dotted line of the area of the cul-de-sac we are looking at. The triangle below the dotted line shows on the other side of the railway how HGVs, concrete mixers or whatever, could come around the other side of the railway and access the site directly using the level crossing.

9182. Crossrail's response to this, which was in the Promoter's Response Document, point 13, as with the other two proposals, the comment on the level crossing was: "The provision of a new level crossing to access the sidings from the south side of the railway, as suggested in the third option, cannot be justified. There are dangers associated with using level crossings, and new level crossings are only permitted in exceptional circumstances." Firstly, this is not a level crossing which would be used by the public, it is a level crossing for a limited number of heavy goods vehicles as used by Crossrail for a limited time. As to the idea that they are only permitted in exceptional circumstances, surely it could be argued that Crossrail itself is very much an exceptional circumstance. To suggest that it is not safe, I can understand there will be concerns over the use of a level crossing in these circumstances but I do not know what the rail traffic is on that line. Off-peak I believe it is something of the order of six trains an hour, three trains in each direction, one train every ten minutes.

9183. The solution that they want to implement using the cul-de-sac consists of dealing with off-peak traffic, 1,500 cars per hour, which is one car every two seconds. Jill and Frank have talked about the problems when you are turning into the cul-de-sac of having to brake hard, and I have also experienced this. You have to hit the brake lights to warn the traffic behind that you are turning left. There is also a turning just beyond that, which is a more major road, which traffic expects you to be taking. When you indicate left they think that you are taking that left turning into Belgrade Road. Obviously a very small percentage of people are residents using the cul-de-sac. The procedure with a traffic stream of 40mph is to slow down. What you can see on screen here is the A127 off to the left with the pavement running through and this is the entrance to the cul-de-sac (Same indicated). The stream of traffic coming at 40mph towards us in the photograph has to brake hard to about 20mph while indicating left, come off the brake lights to avoid the car behind hitting you and then swing around the corner. This is sometimes not happening, as in last week when someone finished up in the bushes.

9184. The idea that a concrete mixer could be doing something similar I find quite horrifying. I do not know how much a concrete mixer weighs but if it is six cubic metres or something, a couple of tonnes per metre, you could be talking about 15-20 tonnes of vehicle toppling over on whoever or whatever is on the outside of that bend at the time.

9185. MS KEMP: The proposed curve, the width of the hairpin, is where you see the sign with the cross on it approximately through the tree line. If you go to the next photograph you will see that curve.

9186. MR PINK: This is one from the inside of the cul-de-sac. The previous photograph was taken from the outside of the bend. One of the problems with widening the road - you can see the width of the road there with the car parked on the corner - although you can make the road wider by taking that pavement and where the bollards are on the grass, widening on that side, you are not in any way making it easier to take the bend by taking the inside of the hairpin. That is not improving the ability to take the turn from the outside by making the hairpin even narrower on the inside. It could be a painted line in the road and that is not going to affect a vehicle's turning circle, especially at speed.

9187. MS KEMP: Can I give you an idea of size. From the pavement, the grass verge on the kerb edge, where that sign is opposite the telegraph pole, that is approximately 25 feet and in proportion the concrete mixers are 271/2 feet long. We are talking about that kind of a hairpin to get that kind of vehicle in there travelling down that road. On that picture where the car is on the left, you cannot see over the bridge, that is where it is blind, coming down on that path. They are talking about doubling the width of the road down there because it is too small, so we are effectively losing a lot of parking spaces. We have been given four extra spaces but there are at least 28 cars which can be using that road. The access to the parking is going to be difficult when they are rebuilding the whole road.

9188. MR BINLEY: I think we can clearly see the difficulties and we understand, the photographs are very helpful. In the Promoter's response, and you may be coming on to this, there is the possibility of another route. Can you just explain to us on the map where that might be so we can see.

9189. MS KEMP: What other route?

9190. MR BINLEY: It says in the Promoter's response: "There have been discussions with a property developer with local land interests to see if an access to serve a proposed residential development could be brought forward to also serve as an access to the worksite. This could have both traffic and environmental benefits but relies on the developer securing agreement with the highway and planning authorities, particularly Transport for London."

9191. MS KEMP: Yes, we did secure a developer.

9192. MR MOULD: We were aware that there was the possibility that development might take place to the rear of the properties on the cul-de-sac and to the south of those properties and if that were to happen we would work with the developer to try and find an alternative means of access to the worksite which might enable us to avoid using, as we propose to do, the cul-de-sac for concrete mixers and other small commercial vehicles. That does depend on that development coming forward and we are not aware that any progress has been made.

9193. CHAIRMAN: Have you liaised with the local authorities in relation to the expectation of planning?

9194. MR MOULD: I do not think it is even at that stage. This was an expression of interest by a developer. I will take instructions on precisely where we have got to on that. The position that I have been told so far is that possibility is no more than that. What we are trying to do is put forward a proposal which reflects the here and now, as it were, but we are leaving open the possibility, as Mr Binley rightly says, that if things change in terms of a third party developer's proposals we may be able to buy into that and make alternative proposals.

9195. MS KEMP: We came up with this proposal last March saying we would try to find a developer who would buy the last six houses. We did find a developer who was also going to build seven flats across the green at the bottom part, the land running alongside. Unfortunately, that has fallen through. We were working with them for nearly a year but that has fallen through. It is a bit difficult for us to say we will run around and find other developers so that Crossrail can have easier access. If we can, we can, but we went down this route purely as a proposal. We did find a developer but nothing has come of it at the moment.

9196. CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much. Is there anything else you wish to add?

9197. MR PINK: If I could make one more point which is expanding on the noise issue. In the Promoter's response, paragraph 12, it says: "The assessment predicted that there will be no significant noise and vibration or air quality impacts arising from construction traffic as a result of Crossrail works in the vicinity of Gidea Park stabling sidings". At the moment you have traffic on the A127, as we have said, 1,500 vehicles per hour in each direction off-peak, and there is some attenuation of noise and visual impact by that row of hawthorn trees there which is useful for screening off the siding from the residents to some degree. By my calculation the houses are 90 feet from the road. One of the figures I have seen for noise levels is at 100 feet, and the houses are slightly more than that but there are trees, noise levels from traffic are likely to be about 50 decibels. To a pedestrian on the pavement, such as the one in the picture, the noise level will be perhaps 70 decibels. Many of the residents in this street are shift workers who need to sleep during the day. Noise levels above 45 decibels can interfere with people sleeping. I have not measured it but I suspect the noise levels there are somewhat higher, although there is double glazing and an element of people getting used to it.

9198. As I say, noise levels on the pavement are 70 decibels and decibels is a logarithmic scale and every time you add ten - 50, 60, 70 - it is four times as great, it is doubling with each ten decibels. So 70 decibels is four times as great a noise level. On the figures from the Defra website, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, heavy goods vehicle noise on a pavement is 90 decibels. Where Crossrail appear to be saying they see no significant change in noise, by my calculation noise could be eight to sixteen times greater if concrete mixers are hammering past people's front doors at one every 20 minutes. If it is 12 a day per working day with a return journey, 24 in eight hours or whatever, that is once every 20 minutes and that could have a serious adverse impact on residents.

9199. MS KEMP: I am sorry, but we feel as though we have not got much chance to go through everything on this. If I could bring up two other points. When we are talking about danger, the pavement running along up to the bridge is used by schoolchildren from infants through to teenagers to at least five different schools in the area. Also, it is the only access route to Ardleigh Green shops for most of the residents, including elderly people walking their dogs, et cetera. In the early part of the morning between eight and nine that pavement is extremely busy with everything from babies in pushchairs and toddlers up to children of 14 and 15. The same is true at lunchtime for the little ones and again in the late afternoon. That is going to be twice the size it is. Everybody is used to that entrance. How we are going to prepare safety for these children I do not know because that will be quite a wide entrance for them to cross and they will not necessarily see the concrete mixers coming up our road and out. If a concrete mixer is trying to get into the road and there are children there we can manage to stop, but if a concrete mixer is travelling down there and there are children crossing that is an aspect we do not want to think about at the moment.

9200. We had a meeting with Crossrail last Thursday, so this last bit has been a bit of a nightmare answering their responses. If I can get Crossrail to forward the email questions and answers, Jonathan Bagg has those, some of these will help. I am trying to think of your time at the moment.

9201. CHAIRMAN: Can I tell you we will keep open all communications and this Committee has asked Crossrail and the Promoter continually to keep avenues open for discussions and communications. Be assured that will occur. The reason I am being a bit pushy at the moment is, as you can see, the Secretary of State is on his feet and responding in a debate so there is going to be a vote very, very soon and we have not yet heard the response from the Promoter. If we continue for much longer - do not worry - there will be no chance to come back with the stenographers so the Committee will reconvene tomorrow morning with the Promoter's response unless we can get it in tonight. It is entirely up to you.

9202. MS KEMP: I am afraid we have got to go somewhere tomorrow. I do speak to Crossrail frequently, so we are trying to work this one out together at the moment. As long as it is not finalised.

9203. CHAIRMAN: Be assured that on the evidence you have given and your petition we will look very seriously at all matters connected to that and in the response provided by the Promoter to ensure we give full consideration to what you are saying. What the response will be I do not know because I am only one of ten. Certainly we will give it full and detailed consideration.

9204. MRS JAMES: I am very concerned that the lady gets the time that she needs.

9205. MS KEMP: Our biggest concern, apart from the danger from the vehicles and dangers to pedestrians and anyone down our road, is where we are going to park while they are doing all of this. We have had some suggestions. If you can show the photograph showing the inside of the road. This shows the edge of the road and you can see right in the front a private road. The dark part on the left is the pavement, which is the council's pavement, but the road between that and the grass is a private road. As you can see, it is a very rough surface. Often we have to park along this side. If there are two cars, these houses will have cars parked outside them as well. What Crossrail is talking about on the right-hand side is they were originally going to put seven car parking spaces there, which is only four for the road. This is a quiet time of the day, even if they are working during the day we have traffic going in and out all the time. Seven spaces along there when everybody comes home is not enough. Then they said they would put 15 side-by-side along the trees. If you put 15 along there with the average car being 16 feet long, and we are parking that side, none of us fancy having a concrete mixer passing a couple of feet from the sides or ends of our parked cars. Even if they put that there, while they are building the road, my car is the blue one and I have got to get out across this road they are going to be completely renewing and widening. I cannot jump over that to get to a parking space. There is not enough room at the far end.

9206. Our concern is there are a lot of single ladies and younger ladies down our road. If you look at the map there are no other places for us to park. We are on the 127 and if you turn left there are no spaces there. We are two or three streets away from where we will have to park. We have a couple of women who work late, nurses, et cetera and it is a long way to walk in the dark. Unfortunately, only a matter of three or four weeks ago there was a murder at Ardleigh Green and a few months prior to that there was a murder just half a mile the other side. We have a lot of problems around the area at night. We have elderly people. We cannot walk from two or three roads away carrying shopping or coming back late at night. Crossrail's solution so far has not been helpful because there is just one way into the road, we cannot get any other access to it, and we have not got enough space to park during the three months while it is being built.

9207. CHAIRMAN: Are you content, Ms Kemp, or have you got anything more to say?

9208. MS KEMP: No, those are our main concerns, and what is happening with the road.

9209. MR MOULD: Sir, I note the time and what you have said about what is available to us tonight. With the best will in the world I will not be able to give the Committee the assistance I want to give in relation to the points that have been made in a very few minutes this evening. What I would like to suggest, if it is convenient to you, is that we find a convenient time when we can come back, convenient to the Petitioners, and, as Mrs James said, we can hear any other points they wish to make when they do not feel they are under a time pressure and I can then provide you with a comprehensive response.

9210. CHAIRMAN: That is very helpful. But at the same time you can keep negotiating with them to see if there are ways in which you can find a solution to their concerns.

9211. MR MOULD: Of course. What I was going to say, sir, if I may, is it has been extremely useful to hear aired in Committee some of the concerns that they have because although we have been talking to them, as Ms Kemp has kindly said, there is nothing like hearing these things aired in public to concentrate the mind on what people are looking to achieve. In particular, in relation to the way forward in terms of arranging details, assume, and I know there are points being made about the alternatives, we go down the line of what we propose, which is to use this cul-de-sac for concrete mixers and other smaller commercial vehicles at the level of usage I have mentioned, on that basis we ----

9212. CHAIRMAN: What I am going to suggest is that we take up your suggestion and we will arrange a time when you can come back to hear Mr Mould's response.

9213. MS KEMP: I would be grateful for that because we have not covered everything.

9214. CHAIRMAN: In the interim he has given the undertakings he has given. We have to move now because there is a division for a vote. I apologise for that. The Committee will recommence tomorrow morning at 10 am.