Several years ago High Road in Loughton has had a makeover. Some new lampposts have been added, the road surface has been re-laid, new parking bays have been added instead of the old ones and several sets of traffic lights for pedestrians have been introduced. All this costed a lot of money and for what?

As a result, the traffic in the centre of Loughton now grinds to a halt during the peak hours. Outside of peak hours, it now takes twice as long to cross the town as took before the “improvements”.

You’re probably thinking of yourself crossing Loughton on the car. Please don’t - please think of all those poor pensioners and older people riding a bus instead. For those using buses 20, 167 and 250 it became a very serious problem because they don’t have any other choice.

The new now metered “easy parking” bays on the sides of Loughton High Road is interrupting the traffic flow. Earlier, the parking was on the parallel small strip of the road and it was perfect but now all cars and buses on the road have to wait for a car to park. If the road was wider, this would be less of a problem. But the road is narrow and this causes a huge problem for those travelling by High Road.

The new traffic lights for shoppers are now everywhere and the period of the green light for the road users is very small. What is the point to have traffic lights every 100 yards? So that shoppers would cross the road to glide from one shop to another? In the busy shopping times, the traffic now barely moves anyway because of the new parking spots, so wouldn’t it be easier for example just to add the traffic islands?

This also relates to the two traffic lights just yards from each other on Old Station Road near Sainsbury’s. Why are they there? It would be much better to add a traffic light for pedestrians walking from and to Loughton Underground Station in the place where they are crossing Alderton Hill near the roundabout because the majority of drivers don’t stop there to let people cross the road. This is a hazardous place and the problem of the road crossing here will need to be addressed at some point. Once I was travelling on the bus there with a group of young girls in front of me and one of them said: “The traffic lights are so close to each other, this is pathetic”. Sorry, council, this is pathetic indeed.

One would read all this and say ok, but Loughton High Road is mainly for those, who do shopping and not for those, who just wants to drive through. The people who drive through may use Alderton Hill and Wellfields - there are no traffic lights there (except for the speed bumps near the school on Alderton Hill). Fair enough - I myself sometimes drive there but notice I use the word “sometimes”. That is because the road surface on Alderton Hill is horrendous. The worst ever road surface I’ve ever encountered in Loughton is on Alderton Hill. It seems to me that the town chiefs have just forgotten about this road. They made people use it by bringing the set of traffic suffocating measures to High Road and - seems like in spite - decided not to do anything about the condition of an alternative route. So it’s either waste of time of the Loughton High Road or waste of your car on Alderton Hill. By the way, High Road is repaired fairy regularly. Probably a lot of council people live nearby.

There are only two positive moment I found in the Loughton High Road makeover. These are new brighter lights and a new pavement (although I can’t remember what was wrong with the old one and why it was necessary to replace it).

With the new Loughton traffic scheme the meters came to Loughton, probably to pay for the awfully designed project. How dare council take the money from people for such a disaster? Everyone I met and discussed this matter pointed to me that the High Road makeover was a disaster. It is a spit in the face of all Loughton residents and visitors. I just hope that the council will learn a lesson and the forthcoming Broadway makeover in Debden will be done with the common sense and for the people’s good.

What is happening with the parking at Loughton’s Morrisons on Saturdays and Sundays? It is simply impossible to park there during the supermarket peak hours from about noon till 3. I can understand that there are the credit crunch and the financial crisis ravaging around and Morrisons supermarket has all over sudden become very popular with locals but these numbers of visitors should have been anticipated when the parking was built initially for Safeway, which Morrisons have bought several years ago.

Look at what Loughton’s Sainsburys did – they built huge parking lot, which is enough to accommodate all peak hour supermarket shoppers. I don’t know how and who they have fought for that and whether they fought at all but the Sainsburys parking is very useful for Loughton.

Look at Harlow Town Centre – a new ASDA, TK Maxx and other shops have been build there and it became obvious that there wouldn’t be enough parking spaces for the customers if nothing is done about that. So they’ve built the huge two-store parking, which together with other parking facilities in Harlow Town Centre is enough for everyone.

Because of the parking limitations I’ve described above I sometimes avoid shopping at Morrisons. I regret this but what can I do? It’s better to go to Sainsbury and park there and shop there rather than going round the Morrisons parking lot together with other unfortunate motorists looking for a soon-to-become-empty parking spot.

Sometimes I park somewhere in Loughton and browse Morrisons with the basket - not a trolley - thus buying much less that I would have if I had a trolley.

Maybe one day Morrison bosses will figure out what’s going on with the parking on Saturdays and Sundays and somehow will extend the shop’s parking area, but at the moment unfortunately they are loosing their local customers.

The green spaces in Loughton are very important for the Loughton residents. They allow children to be active outside of their homes and in the same time to be monitored by their parants. They allow adults to be active too by doing some jogging and excercises on the fresh air away from the cars and buses. They allow the dog owners to walk their dogs there and to play with them.

The green spaces were wisely put in our town to bring the joy to those who live nearby. This is not concrete London and not even Athens where in some areas for miles around there are no green spaces at all. We love Loughton because of its greenness and areas free from cars and houses.

And now our “much-loved” Epping Forest District Council decided to deprive the Loughton people of their pride and joy because the government don’t have enough houses to give to the immigrants who come to the UK, claim benefits and live in houses that are given to them by the government itself. That is the only reason for Gordon Brown’s government to build millions of new houses around London and that’s why councils are obliged to find the space to build them.

But that’s the subject for another much wider discussion. Here, I want to focus on the protection of green spaces in Loughton. They are mentioned on the Loughton Residents Association website here and are not just some derelict overgrown areas – these are spaces that are well looked-after and used by people. (Click here for the related Loughton Council news.) Maybe except the little wood alongside Oakwood Hill, all of the green spaces in Loughton are there for a reason. And even the wooden area is there to shield the town from the motorway M11.

All the green spaces in town need to be preserved at any cost because they are there for our children and children of our children. How can we do that? That’s a good question. Do what you can: sign the LRA petition, send a letter to Loughton and Epping Forest councils arguing agains the concrete jungles in Loughton, put a banner on your car or in the window of your house, spread the word by telling everyone about the problem.

Indeed, in addition to the reasons for the green spaces, there are plenty of reasons against Loughton expansion and more and more residents. The town’s infrastructure is not capable of supporting more and more cars on the roads. The capacity of schools in Loughton cannot expand forever. The surgeries are full. The supermarkets are overcrowded. Why do Loughton people have to suffer because of the stupid policies carried out by the government of this country in the name of people who oppose these policies?

Say “Yes” to preserve the existing green spaces in Loughton!

Say “No” to more houses in Loughton!

Save Loughton’s authenticity, stop it becoming just another London suburb!