Published: January 27, 2012
by PETER GRUNER

THE plight of struggling traders in Islington’s Essex Road sparked a row this week between the Town Hall and the London Mayor’s traffic arm, Transport for London.

Islington’s Labour regeneration chief Councillor Paul Convery hit out at TfL for objecting to plans for more parking bays in the road. “We want to put in more short-stay parking for traders but TfL are opposing us,” he said.

“We have great sympathy for the traders and are doing what they want. But there is a possibility that TfL may block our parking scheme. We don’t want a long protracted dispute with TfL.”

However a spokesman for TfL argued that, although it has objected to parking bays where they interrupt the flow of traffic, the final decision is with the local authority.

Traders are so fed up they are threatening to hold more impromptu demonstrations in bus lanes over the lack of parking.

Antiques dealer Nadine Davies, who led a bus lane protest before Christmas at the Canonbury end of the road, has now collected more than 1,000 signatures for a petition opposing restrictions that remove parking bays from outside shops and firms.

Last November, a group of traders stood in a bus lane for a short period in a symbolic protest over lack of parking for deliveries as well as spaces for customers.

Ms Davies, who owns antiques store Architectural Forum, said she might even be forced to move out of the borough after more than 20 years.

“We can’t park outside our own premises because of extended bus lanes,” she said. “It’s hindering business at a time when we need all the help we can get.”

Naomi Newstead, Conservative London Assembly candidate for North East London, joined the campaign this week. She has written to Islington’s Labour council leader Councillor Catherine West and London Mayor Boris Johnson about the issue.

Ms Newstead, accompanied by two-year-old twins Austin and Byron, said that Essex Road could lose its unique specialist shops unless parking is improved.

She added: “Traders, in addition to a difficult economic climate, are being affected by complicated parking restrictions which act as a deterrent to potential customers but also impact on delivery arrangements.

“Many of these shops rely on trade from customers who need the use of cars to pick up heavy items.”