Lewisham Council continue to show great commitment to creating welcoming and safer streets for their community. The Council has formulated a “good growth” vision for Lewisham, which aims to enhance the area by expanding pedestrianised roads that are greener and offer increased accessibility to all.
Our engagement team works closely with the Council to present their vision to the community and to collect views on their growth plan’s feasibility. Currently, our focus is on getting them involved in sharing ideas for improving Deptford High Street, which is located right at the heart of Deptford.
The High Street is already attracting a wide range of visitors and businesses by being home to Deptford market traders. However, since the Covid-19 pandemic has changed how we interact with our outdoor spaces, light has been shed on the negative sides of the area.
Residents told us that there is a lack of lighting and green spaces, a high number of parked cars which reduce the space for pedestrians and cyclists, and reoccurring scenes involving anti-social behaviour, especially against women.
How are we helping the Council to realise their vision?
Community engagement is at the heart of Lewisham’s vision. Before planning any intervention, we wanted to know people’s views on what needs improving as well as the reasons and what would be the best solutions for these moving forward.
Over the summer, our engagement team set up a Deptford High Street consultation webpage. The page included a survey for the community and one for local businesses. We asked the community about their reasons for travelling to Deptford, their modes of travel and what could attract them to visit the area more. We also asked businesses how they are doing after the pandemic.
Deptford High Streets’ portal also included an interactive map of the area, that the community and businesses could use to select a specific street and leave comments on current issues and potential solutions.
After the initial consultation phase closed, we received 1,064 contributions to the surveys and interactive map. We also spoke with more than 250 people at market pop-ups, design workshops and site walks. Our engagement team has now collected all the feedback and shared initial findings on the webpage.
Our findings on what the community and local businesses want is:
- Cleaner and greener spaces
- Less parked cars and a higher priority for pedestrians and cyclists
- Local businesses told us more about delivery and stall set up times, and how these could be improved in their favour
- Safer and more accessible places to walk and socialise
Addressing safety concerns
A high number of the community’s feedback focused on safety concerns. Most of this feedback came from women, who shared many experiences of anti-social behaviour and sexual harrassment.
During the consultation, we partnered with “Our Streets Now”, a movement of women, girls and people of marginalised gender who battle against sexual harassment across our streets. Working collaboratively, we organised a personal safety site visit of Deptford High Street with 15 local girls and women to find out how to make this a safer community for them. We shared designs of how more lighting, trees and pedestrianised areas could help address some of their concerns and they shared further suggestions and comments to improve the area.
We spoke with Susannah at “Making Spaces for Girls”, addressing concerns around the lack of inclusive places for girls in our parks. Susannah shared how they’re engaging with local girls, collecting feedback and getting them involved in the decision-making process to create a safer and more welcoming space for them.
Our teams at Project Centre are also committed to making safer streets for women and girls. Safety and accessibility are two of our top priorities when engaging with the communities and producing designs. We want to make sure that all voices are heard, as that is the key to creating welcoming and attractive spaces for everyone.
