Looking back: a pedestrianisation proposal from 2017 [Mayor’s Office]

AN unprecedented alliance of neighbourhood groups launched a fightback after the Mayor of London announced the rebirth of his Oxford Street pedestrianisation legacy project.

Groups in Fitzrovia, Marylebone, Soho, Mayfair, Paddington, Belgravia, Hyde Park, St John’s Wood and Covent Garden have warned against the “land grab” by Sadiq Khan.

The leader of the Westminster City Council wrote to the mayor yesterday, Thursday, with a list of 10 questions as an internal “red-on-red” war engulfed the Labour Party ahead of last night’s by-election for West End ward.

And Labour’s Adam Hug faced calls to resign by the leader of the Conservatives at Wednesday’s full council meeting after he was urged to launch a legal challenge in the High Court against the Labour Mayor of London.

The council has spent two years pushing its own proposals through the planning system in a bid to redevelop the area without full pedestrianisation after the mayor’s original plan – to create a rival to Time Square in New York – was scrapped in 2018 due to a political backlash.

Westminster’s £150million Oxford Street District (OSD) programme now looks set to be gazumped by the mayor’s government-backed announcement on Tuesday, one that was held back from party colleagues over fears of a “leak”.

Out on the street yesterday, shoppers told Extra how they hoped the pedestrianisation could boost business and improve the environment.

Tourist Hiric Veal said he would “feel safer” in a pedestrianised street and another, who did not give their name, said “because there was a lot of traffic and the streets are quite narrow I think it would be a lot easier to walk around to the shops”.

Transport safety campaigners also welcomed the new proposals, including Tom Kearney – critically injured by a bus in Oxford Street – who called for 2016 promises to pedestrianise the street to be kept.

But, in a statement backed by a dozen high profile neighbourhood groups in Westminster, Tim Lord, chair of the Soho Society, said: “The mayor’s preference for grandstanding rather than getting down to the hard graft of discussion and compromise puts him well outside the better practice we had hoped to see from the new Labour government. What is disappointing is that the mayor thought it appropriate to announce his initiative with no discussion with his Labour colleagues at the council.”

At Wednesday’s meeting Paul Swaddle, Conservative group leader challenged Cllr Hug: “It’s quite clear that you have no influence on London or national policy for the Labour Party. Will you help lead a judicial review if needed? Or will you resign and make way for someone who stands up for residents?”

Cllr Hug said: “There is no decision that has been taken by the government. That is a very premature discussion. We are going to try to put forward our position. We will look at what other responses are. We want to work pragmatically.”

In his letter to Sadiq Khan he wrote: “Though our initial visions for the future of the street may differ, I know we share a commitment to making sure the nation’s high street has a bright future, one that brings benefits locally, regionally, and nationally.”

His 10 points included a warning that a pedestrianised scheme could lay the street more open to a terrorist attack and that serious thought would be required on how to maintain “Oxford Street’s vital Christmas trade and thousands of retail jobs”.

Altering bus routes would need to be done sympathetically and the council and New West End Company should be compensated for the time wasted on the OSD.”

At a photo-shoot with deputy prime minister Angela Rayner on the rooftop of the John Lewis department store on Tuesday afternoon, the mayor told BBC London that he had not given the council greater notice of his intentions because he did not want the story to “leak”. He said he was “embarrassed” at the state of Oxford Street and he wanted to rescue it from “managed decline”.

The mayor’s spokesperson said: “Oxford Street was once the jewel in the crown of Britain’s retail sector but there is no doubt that it has suffered in recent years and urgent action is needed to give the iconic high street a new lease of life. This is why the mayor has announced bold new plans to pedestrianise Oxford Street, to increase visitor numbers and encourage people to stay longer, boosting growth in London and around the country.

“Plans for this exciting project will be developed in collaboration with businesses, residents and other stakeholders, to ensure the project can best serve all Londoners, and build a better, fairer and greener London for everyone.”

While concerns about pollution from log-jammed traffic around the pedestrianised street remain, environmental and clean-living promoting groups have backed the project.

Mark Smithies from Westminster Cycling Campaign said: “The recent announcement by the mayor over the future of Oxford Street, suggests to me that there is a wider concern that the current City of Westminster administration lacks ambition and is failing at delivery.”

Opposing the scheme this week: The Soho Society, Belgravia Society, The Thorney Island Society Paddington Waterways & Maida Vale Society, St John’s Wood Society, Residents Society of Mayfair and St James’s, South East Bayswater Residents’ Association, Fitzrovia Neighbourhood Association, Fitzrovia West Neighbourhood Forum, Notting Hill East Neighbourhood Forum, Cathedral Area Residents’ Group, Harrowby & District Residents’ Association, The Queen Anne’s Gate Residents’ Association, Belgravia Neighbourhood Forum, Marylebone Association, The Hyde Park Estate Association, and Covent Garden Community Association.