Meeting Thames Water (part two in a series)

Last Thursday, for the second time, we summoned Thames Water to City Hall for another meeting on the replacement programme which is underway in Maida Vale.

We had a productive meeting and we're glad that there has been some progress by both Thames and Westminster Parking Services towards resolving some of the problems we have highlighted. In particular, Thames have begun to tighten up on their operations and Parking Services have temporarily relaxed their enforcement rules in affected roads (which has been a huge help).

We re-iterated, however, that there were still significant areas where improvement was needed:

• that Thames must not operate in areas where they do not have the correct permission (they're getting better, but still seem to be trying their luck in places)
  that there was too much variation in the quality and effect of the works between roads in Maida Vale (no more Essendine, Wymering or Morshead Roads please)
• that works were still taking too long (and residents were being inconvenienced as a result)

We have asked Thames/Parking Services/Council Officers to take action on a number of other issues:

• that Thames provide a short report of their activities-to-date in every road in Maida Vale where they have operated, with information on the reasons for late starting/delays/late ending etc.
• that a revised schedule of future operations is provided
• that Parking Services provide information on the effects of the changes to the parking enforcement rules
• that a discussion takes place on how suspension signs can be removed quickly once work is finished (we pointed out the obvious answer to this one)
• that more consultation is undertaken before future locations are chosen for the storage containers (such as the large white ones on Wymering and Widley)
• that an explanation is provided for the burst water main on Sunday 8th April on the Elgin Avenue-Randolph Avenue junction

Overall, as Councillors, we believe that Thames are slowly getting better - and they have displayed a commendable willingness to listen in recent weeks. The next test is how they work on new roads like Delaware, Castellain and Lauderdale (and whether they finish speedily in the roads they are already on). As we've already noted, Thames moved into Delaware on Monday and we're watching closely. We'll have no hesitation in hauling them straight back into City Hall if standards do not carry on improving.

Alastair, Jan and Lee

PS Please let us know how you feel the Thames water works are going. We'd be delighted to help in any way we can.