The most rabid propagandist for Crossrail 2 would have been hard pressed to claim more that a handful supported the scheme.
One of the difficulties facing officers in this neck of the woods is trying to pull the wool over residents: many residents have considerable business experience and will not be led by the nose.
Poor Michelle Dix, Tfl's Director of Planning found this to her cost when faced with a question from Richard Grantley, co-chair of MISARA.
Grantley, a retired project finance expert, asked Dr Dix whether a cost benefit analysis into the merits or otherwise of Crossrail on Kings Road had been carried out:after all, with over £1 billion of public money at risk, it would be a natural precursor to an investment of this magnitude.
Poor Doc Dix looked very confused and admitted no such analysis had been prepared.
When asked to give an absolute undertaking an analysis would be prepared, by an independent party, before a decision was taken, Dr Dix refused to answer.
No one wonder there was a eruption of, "answer the question' from the body of the hall.
Evidently when the Independent spoke to Tfl's PR people they sneeringly referred to protesters as 'retired thespians'....
What a foolish mistake; after all, the campaign's leader, Chris Lenon, oversaw the taxation policy for one of the world's biggest mining groups! Hardly a junior PR job.....
The project falls into the category of "we decided to do it". It is all about judgement, leadership and conviction. Public opinion is a nuisance that needs to be dealt with.
ReplyDeleteAsking for a Cost Benefit Analysis is silly, naïve, and wasting time.
Holland Park School (£100 million) never had a Cost Benefit Analysis. So why should Crossrail? (£1 billion)
DeleteLord Wolfson, one of Cameron's Peers and an economic advisor to the Government, is on record as saying that Crossrail is a bad use of public money. There are better ways that it can/should be spent.
DeleteThis is the reason why Tfl will resist any ideas of a Cost Benefit Analysis
There are certain things that we decide to do in life because they are "right". An engagement ring would never survive the rigours of a Cost Benefit Analysis. Inappropriate in the circumstances.
DeleteBelieve in your Leaders.........
The demented Dame refers to the "difficulty for Officers of pulling the wool over residents eyes". Silly girl.
ReplyDeleteWhat salon does she dream that she is in?
The reality of "planning decisions" is that the Royal Borough is a private Monoploy Board for a select group of Officers and Conservative Councillors who have hijacked power to play their game. In some cases there is the hard nosed business of personal gain from the coffers of greedy developers (Queen Elizabeth Hall, Holland Park School, Kensington Odeon, Commonwealth Centre, Marlborough School, Nottinghill Gate, Lancer Square, etc). Journalists need to single out half a dozen names and compare their assets (especially holiday homes) against declared earnings.
And in other cases there are the "grand gestures of history". The thirst to outdo the Victorian philanthropists. Cllr Daniel Moylan was the Master of this Monopoly train set. When he decided to tart up Exhibition Road and spend £30 million of tax payers money to import pink granite from China, he made a personal and grand gesture of "aggrandisement". I remember the Cabinet Meeting that approved the project after Cllr Moylan reported that "we have consulted widely and no one wants it. Therefore the Cabinet needs to prepare for two years of protest. But it will pass".
Here, here! Roll on Crossrail in the Kings Road
Does "Observer" remember Sloane Square? James Thomson put a fire cracker up Moylan's back side.
DeleteSloane Square went down the pan.
Disgraced ex Leader Cllr Cockell was Chairman of that particular Cabinet Meeting. There was a look of ecstasy on his reptile face
DeleteThat shrine of probity, Derek Myers, took the minutes. This same "doer of Gods work" had the ingenuity to get Cockle out of a hole by retrospectively authorising the use of the Bentley to "save taxi fares".
DeleteNote to Editors
Derek Myers was the highest paid Town Clerk in Britain. Courtesy of disgraced ex Leader Cllr Cockle
Always follow the money if you want to understand what is going on
DeleteCllr Paget-Brown supports Crossrail in Chelsea. The Leader has spoken!
ReplyDeleteThe 'Leader' has spoken? More like GOD has spoken....amen
DeleteHow stupid of Tfl to put a novice like Michelle Dix into the Bear Pit. Of course she was going to be torn to pieces. Tfl should have fielded a hardened warrior. Moylan would have been the perfect advocate to see off the pathetic protestors.
ReplyDeleteYes, Moylan knows all about seeing off "pathetic protesters'....just like he beat off the advocates of a new runway for Heathrow. And Boris Airport? No one dares mention that particular hare brained idea. Heading towards sixty and with little to look forward to Moylan is finito
DeleteI think residents would have welcomed Mr Moylan. Pity he didn't show up. There is always next time - he could also explain why residents were wrong about Sloane Square.
DeleteA giant cut down in his prime. The Royal Borough is the loser
DeleteNo, the loser is Moylan...point to one success?
Delete£160k/year in a competitive world? Public status? Elected Office - MANY TIMES. President of the Cambridge Union? Foreign Office? Deputy Leader? Deputy Mayor of London? Architectural Awards? And the list goes on.
DeleteNot bad at all.
I think even your hero would dispute he was ever President of the Cambridge Union....facts, dear boy, facts.
Delete£160k a year sponged from various taxpayer funded 'jobs'. Why did he leave the FO so suddenly? Deputy Leader of some little local council? Deputy Mayor of London? I don't think so. We had no idea your boyfriend was an architect....
The University has no record of attendance by one Daniel Moylan
DeleteSupporter of Moylan
DeletePlease be so kind as to cease 'supporting' me. It is not helping.
In fact, I am a Balliol man and was President of the Oxford Union-not the Cambridge Union
Of course. Of course.
DeleteYou were brilliant. I remember the debate that you Chaired with disgraced ex President Nixon - a triumph that you managed to entice him across the "pond"
A very fine student. A credit to his country. Outrageous, outlandish, a canter of style.
DeletePray tell, my dear Moylan, what was it that interrupted your brilliant career at the FO? I trust it had nothing in common with my own fall from grace....
DeleteNot a fall from grace. Not at all. A careless indiscretion and a vindictive HR officer
DeleteWhat an impressive CV for Cllr Moylan. Somewhat different from the other Tory fodder in the K&C Council.
DeleteGrantley? GRANTLEY??
ReplyDeleteWhat has he ever done in his life? Is he not one of those wasted Lords?
My advice to you is this....
DeleteYou are clearly very stupid and in such cases it's always best to keep a low profile so that the sheer depth of your stupidity remains as hidden for as long as possible.
Now, to answer your question. Richard Grantley was one of the City's most respected figures in the sphere of project financing for complex billion £ plus projects....and you? Who the hell are you? Go and hide away, you silly fellow.
A project like this needs to be fronted by a Heavyweight. Otherwise it is dead in the water.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy needs men of vision to save the lowest common denominators from themselves
ReplyDeletePish. The protestors do not want their quaint lives disturbed. In the Kings Road the residents are rich and they know how to shout. Swat the mosquitos!
DeleteWhenever anyone uses an expression like 'pish' you know they are really, really dangerously boring
DeleteThe little pisher obviously does not live or work in the area plenty of those who are not wealthy live in the area who will be effected by this odious HS2
ReplyDeleteCllr Moylan (who stood against Cllr Paget-Brown for the Leadership) has stopped briefing against PB. It seems that Moylan has withdrawn from public life.
ReplyDeleteWatch this space
DeleteIs it true that Daniel is considering entering a monastic order?
DeleteDaniel is currently re evaluating his life
ReplyDeleteThe Dame and her hornets are a truly sad bunch of people
ReplyDeleteI think, 11:11, we should take the readers very seriously. If it's true that there have been nearly 1.7 million page views it shows the Hornets Nest has substantial Borough wide influence. I wish I had taken it more seriously....after all, the damaging things the Dame wrote about me, which filtered through to the national press, cost me a peerage.
ReplyDelete"Voice of Sanity" is correct. Lord Grantley is silly, naïve and a waste of time.
ReplyDeleteRichard is not silly, or naïve, or a waste of time. Nor is he Irish. But he is a papist.
DeleteNothing wrong with being a papist. Having met Grantley a few times I can only assume 20:00 has met an imposter. Grantley is shrewd, sharp and delightful company. That might account for the fact that Margaret Thatcher thought highly of him.I just getting the feeling 20:00 is sad little sod with few accomplishments to his name.
DeleteI happened to look up L. Grantley's record....20:00 is obviously deep in the deadly sin of envy...
DeleteGrantley gets an Open Scholarship in Mathematics and graduates with a law degree from Oxford. He then goes on to run Thatcher's office and work as one of her special advisers. His career in the City spanned directorships with Morgan Grenfell; Deutsche Bank and HSBC. Most normal people would tend to describe this as a glittering career.
Oh, yes....forgot President of the Oxford Union
DeleteAll very well. Grantley and Moylan are obviously distinguished chaps. But what about Crossrail in the Kings Road. Will it be stopped?
ReplyDeleteWhat is the next step?
Remember Moylan's words. "We have consulted widely and no one wants it. The Cabinet needs to prepare for two years of protest. But it will pass".
DeleteNothing has changed...
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DeleteMaybe it will pass, as OWL says. But for those who don't want to see Chelsea decimated for 15 years and then end up as just another suburban high street, there is still plenty of fight left.
DeleteTake the battle to Greg Hands. He doesn't want a station in King's Road, he wants it at Imperial Wharf or Fulham Broadway where the local need is manifestly greater. But that it seems is an engineering impossibility and would add to both the cost and the journey times on the line so is hardly going to be a big attraction for people living in Surrey and Essex.
Take the battle to TfL. They said that a Chelsea station would unlock 1,000 new homes. But ask them where those homes will be built and they haven't a clue. Timothy Coleridge said at the 3 November meeting at Chelsea Town Hall that new homes would be needed over the next 30years to replace old buildings at the end of their useful lives in West Chelsea. But what's that got to do with Crossrail 2?
As for the cost-benefit analysis that started this string, my recollection of the 3 November meeting was that Michele Dix said that the cost benefit analysis was undertaken for the line as a whole, ie 200,000 new homes and 200,000 new jobs. When someone else asked how the 50-50 funding of the line would work in Chelsea, she said that the 50-50 split would work for the line as a whole, and not for every separate component of it. Now that's a great story for Boris and any other London politician - "commercial development in the outer reaches will fund a station for the poor deprived people of Chelsea". Pull the other one.
So the answer for Coleville Resident is you should fill in the TFL survey question 20 with the simple sentence "no Crossrail 2 station in Chelsea" and, as the Dame wrote in her earlier post, explain why in your words. And write to Greg Hands saying the same thing.