Woolwich QE hospital street to see new bus stands, cycle lanes before taken over by Greenwich Council
A long standing issue of roads at Stadium Road and Baker Road outside Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich looks set to be addressed as plans are in to transfer ownership.
Currently the road is managed by the local Lewisham and Greenwich Trust – and for many years there’s been complaints over poor road and street design and maintenance. Bouncing over potholes in a bus en route to the site while in poor health is no fun.
Now the streets look set to be adopted by Greenwich Council. First, the Trust will upgrade it before handing over.
A report within the application states that “a revised road corridor consisting of 1.8m footways, 3m cycleway and 6.5m carriageway was considered acceptable in principle to RBG Highways, subject to swept path analysis being undertaken”.
In addition “the bus terminus will be reconstructed to enable it to be adopted by RBG and will re-provide the space for bus stands and turning manoeuvres.”
Hospital site
The site replaced Greenwich Hospital as the main facility for the borough around the turn of the millennium taking over what was formerly a military hospital. The location raised complaints from the beginning due to its somewhat remote location from much of the borough and a lack of local facilities.
If you’ve ever stayed there you’ll know that even heading to a local shops for food and drink isn’t the quickest option leaving a tiny WH Smiths.
TfL had to divert many buses to serve the spot, and roads outside have long been in poor condition requiring regular short term patch-ups.
Road ownership came under different bodies as the application makes clear:
“Both Stadium Road and Baker Road are private roads and are owned and maintained by the Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust.
The Trust owns the land where the main hospital (the Queen Elizabeth Hospital) is located on the western side, whilst the land to the east of the road is either Trust land or under the ownership of the Ministry of Defence (MoD).
Where residential development fronts the road on the western side (Baker Road), the land is under private ownership.”
Poor design
While the road outside may change, the link towards the main entrance remains poor.
The PFI-funded hospital is a guide on how not to design pedestrian friendly space. The main entrance only has paving on one side of the road.
It hardly presents as a welcoming place (as much as a hospital can) with legacy fencing dating from military days still in place 25 years on. It resembles a prison.
People will often be seen walking in the road owing to a lack of paving – or paving that doesn’t offer an indirect route.
The location of landscaping too hampers direct pedestrian access on foot from buses and the car parks to the main entrance.
As for the road outside, this isn’t the first plan for changes. A previous application was approved on 22 February 2016. Little happened and planning permission lapsed in February 2019.
The latest plan can be viewed here.
I can’t remember the last time I saw a cyclist using Baker Road/Stadium Road. Safer to use the routes on the common.
Presumably the cycle lanes mean floating bus stops.
Few will cycle if its as bad as it is now. No harm in putting something safer there.
No floating bus stops it appears. The first image shows the road layout and bus stops. The cycle lane is outside of paving space and not between road and paving/bus stops.
The cycle and pedestrian options there currently are appalling. I’ve had to object though as the plans aren’t LTN 1/20 compliant with basic errors of pavements and cycleways giving way at junctions. Pretty poor and would need redoing at a later date as they’re having to start doing around the Olympic Village developments.
The roads are in a poor state of repair and have not been well maintained over the years.
With Stadium Road and Baker Road being taken over by Royal Borough of Greenwich is great news and very welcomed news for users of these roads.
The improved bus stand will also be welcomed.
Some of the staff at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital cycle to and from work so improving these roads will make it safer for them too. A win win situation.