Dear LPG,

Having had many a conversation on the subject with friends in my age group, I have found out that I am one of many older people who no longer bother to go to Lewisham shopping centre because of the so-called improvements that have taken place near the clock tower in the past five or so years. 

It is equally frustrating for both drivers and pedestrians.  It appears that little thought went into the bus route from the Tesco store to the main shopping centre, leaving the pedestrian option back to the Riverdale Centre presenting a real challenge for people who have difficulty walking any distance. People approaching the centre from the direction of Tesco’s have a serious walk ahead of them, because there is no practical bus stop that they can use.   There are also very limited places, where people who find negotiating buses and walking difficult, can be dropped off by taxi or use a vehicle with a blue badge and using the designated road crossing adds a substantial distance to the walk,

I find that many of my fellow older drivers avoid the area because of the really dangerous road layout where the large roundabout used to be.  In my opinion the middle lane in what is now marked on the map as Rennell Street, leading right to Lee High Road and left for Tesco’s store leaves every car that enters it with a dilemma, regardless of which way they want to go.

If they turn left towards Greenwich they can find themselves with nearside traffic fighting to cut into their lane, then they realise that the nearside lane will force them to merge or join the buses in Lewisham Station, while driving right towards Lee also means fighting your way to a merged lane. I suppose it all works fairly well when there is not much traffic in the area, but that rarely happens in reality. The situation is not much better when traveling in the opposite direction where the confusion results in a middle-lane battle for Molesworth Street on the left, or the even more complicated trip towards Loampit Vale for those trying to turn right.  I note that they very quickly took away that very special middle lane marking where the arrow suggests that traffic using it can go either left or right but the vehicles that travel there regularly have now learned to fight their way to which ever direction they prefer and if one happens to be in the third or fourth car in one of those queues you can see the fight for position supremacy that occurs as soon as the lights change, which often leaves me cringing for fear of a collision.  

I am sure that some younger people will conclude that I am past the age when I should be driving, which is why I feel the need to make this point or perhaps it was Lewisham council’s aim to discourage people from driving in the area.    I am not saying it is unmanageable, but it is an accident waiting to happen when one looks at some of the ‘dog eat dog’ type driving manoeuvres that take place in the area.

So, I find myself asking the designers of the project why they did not observe the basic mathematical principle and work out that three into two does not and will never go unless there are a few bits left over!

DJ, Lewisham