New(?) East > Central London Route (avoiding Bow)

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Alan Whicker

Senior Member
Normally I go up Stratford High Street, then through Three Mills to avoid Bow, then back onto Mile End Road to my destination at Tower Hill. I often thought there must be a better way through the newly-opened Olympic Park from Leytonstone where I live, but I've never really had the time to find out. Seems I wasn't alone.

'teninchwheels' (hello if you're reading this) also lives in Leytonstone and has found a way through to The City without going anywhere near Stratford Gyratory, Bow Roundabout or Ruckholt Road. I tried it this morning - it's far more pleasant than my old route. Also - although he doesn't mention it, the bit near the Hackney Wick lift is a good place to get onto the Lea Navigation for Docklands.

Here's a link - (there's a map).

http://teninchwheels.wordpress.com/2014/04/11/melancholy-is-incompatible-with-bicycling/
 
I did Cathall Road, Ruckholt Road then Hackney Wick, Vicky Park then Bishops Way and Hackney Road. Did that for eight years but the roads all changed now. that route thru the Olympic Park looks aces and skills.
 

Luke Redpath

Well-Known Member
For those still needing to get down to Stratford but wanting to avoid Bow, you can take the footbridge over the A12 near Victoria Park and then get on to the Greenway which leads you down, behind the Olympic Park and out onto Stratford high street onto the newer segregated section of CS2 (watch out for left hooks). You can the n take the bus lane contraflow to avoid the gyratory system entirely (assuming you're heading towards Romford Road and Ilford).

Not perfect, there's some slow riding/walking involved due to the Crossrail works at Stratford, but it certainly beats Bow roundabout or the flyover.
 

subaqua

What’s the point
Location
Leytonstone
well bugger me sideways , am going to have to ride that and put a gpx up for peeps. I just need to sort a route out from the wick to andrews road to avoid viccy park road and its increasingly disturbed road users
 

deptfordmarmoset

Full time tea drinker
Location
Armonmy Way
It's odd that there's a route along Wallis Road. I was up there last week but headed to the Velopark off the footbridge by Victoria Park using the bridge over the canal to the south. There were a fair number of other cyclists using the same route. I didn't notice the Wallis Road route from either the east or the west. Still, I've got a fully empty morning tomorrow....
 

stowie

Legendary Member
I saw this post and decided to change from the usual route back via CS2 / Bow Flyover. Got to Mile end and went up to Victoria Park. Lovely ride through the park and over the bridge. However got to the Olympic park and my very poor sense of direction meant I ended up doing a very large loop around deserted roads until I finally stumbled across the Leyton Road / Major Road junction. I missed the Wallis Road lift (which had intrigued me) and ended up going over White Post Lane.

Cycling around the Olympic village is nice a the moment as there is virtually no traffic. In fact it is a bit eerie. But when all those flats are occupied and the roads are completed I wonder how pleasant it will be then. The bits of "cycle infrastructure" look like the usual rubbish when they actually had the opportunity to design the road system for walking, cycling and public transport from the ground up. Are all the flats going to be sold with a no car ownership clause? Because if not, parking is going to utter chaos. Anyway, I chuckled at the bit of intuitive and well thought our cycle signage I happened across just before the footbridge..

IMAG0146.jpg
 

subaqua

What’s the point
Location
Leytonstone
sign is doing what it should.

shows cycling on pavement is prohibited and the lane on the road should be used denoted by the blue rectangular one . not even OPLC would be silly enough to put a sign in the road ( although I will caveat that ODA were so anything is possible)
 

subaqua

What’s the point
Location
Leytonstone
oh and how people laughed when I said that the legacy would be far from good. Us schmucks in the East will be paying for this bilge for years and years and years.
 

stowie

Legendary Member
sign is doing what it should.

shows cycling on pavement is prohibited and the lane on the road should be used denoted by the blue rectangular one . not even OPLC would be silly enough to put a sign in the road ( although I will caveat that ODA were so anything is possible)

This is true, but I would contend the signage is hardly intuitive. And that narrow on-road cycle lane lasts for a couple of hundred metres before taking cyclists back off onto the separate footbridge. And the reason the paint on the pavement is there is because, for reasons only known to the planners, the cycle lane before the junction (behind the picture) instructs cyclists to come off to use a cumbersome and tight toucan crossing. Cycling around, I see utterly disjointed cycle paths (under barriers at the moment) which stop at every side entrance and disappear without trace. The signage is simply appalling for anyone not in a car - the route above is great but on a lot of it I am very unclear if I should be cycling on it. Oh, and the lift at Hackney Wick isn't working.

Here is my gripe. The powers that be had a blank sheet of paper and a remit that the Olympics were going to be the greenest ever with a "sustainable" legacy and the best - the very best - they came up with is all of this. Which, from a cycling, walking, and indeed general planning consideration is, at best, a bit shite and at worst considerably worse than some of the stuff our local council foists on us. I am a charitable man, so will assume that the planning wasn't done by people with absolutely no clue outside private car travel, but they were instead slipped hallucinogenics in their tea and this is the result of a rather bad trip.

At the moment the private car traffic is so light that the roads are easy to cycle on and little of this matters - you simply use the road. But is this going to be the case when the 3,500 new homes are occupied? I suspect not.
 

subaqua

What’s the point
Location
Leytonstone
This is true, but I would contend the signage is hardly intuitive. And that narrow on-road cycle lane lasts for a couple of hundred metres before taking cyclists back off onto the separate footbridge. And the reason the paint on the pavement is there is because, for reasons only known to the planners, the cycle lane before the junction (behind the picture) instructs cyclists to come off to use a cumbersome and tight toucan crossing. Cycling around, I see utterly disjointed cycle paths (under barriers at the moment) which stop at every side entrance and disappear without trace. The signage is simply appalling for anyone not in a car - the route above is great but on a lot of it I am very unclear if I should be cycling on it. Oh, and the lift at Hackney Wick isn't working.

Here is my gripe. The powers that be had a blank sheet of paper and a remit that the Olympics were going to be the greenest ever with a "sustainable" legacy and the best - the very best - they came up with is all of this. Which, from a cycling, walking, and indeed general planning consideration is, at best, a bit ****e and at worst considerably worse than some of the stuff our local council foists on us. I am a charitable man, so will assume that the planning wasn't done by people with absolutely no clue outside private car travel, but they were instead slipped hallucinogenics in their tea and this is the result of a rather bad trip.

At the moment the private car traffic is so light that the roads are easy to cycle on and little of this matters - you simply use the road. But is this going to be the case when the 3,500 new homes are occupied? I suspect not.
see my post above yours .

we were promised brilliant legacy , and i said from day 1 it would come to nothing and we would be shafted. FFS Temple Mills lane is still shut and that was supposed to reopen to ALL traffic in January 2013 acording to the original road closure notice and signage erected in 2010.
That means that all local traffic for leyton leytonstone ot forest gate needs to go through the park or Leyton. the local traffic now mainly clogs up Leyton and grove green due to the p1ss poorly thought out "improvement" work on Ruckholt road.

why the boroughs couldn't collaborate a little better over this I cannot understand as they managed for Building Control services for construction. the bit I worked on was borough wise in Hackney but one BCO we had was from Tower Hamlets and another from Newham.

sheer lunacy
 

stowie

Legendary Member
see my post above yours .

we were promised brilliant legacy , and i said from day 1 it would come to nothing and we would be shafted. FFS Temple Mills lane is still shut and that was supposed to reopen to ALL traffic in January 2013 acording to the original road closure notice and signage erected in 2010.
That means that all local traffic for leyton leytonstone ot forest gate needs to go through the park or Leyton. the local traffic now mainly clogs up Leyton and grove green due to the p1ss poorly thought out "improvement" work on Ruckholt road.

why the boroughs couldn't collaborate a little better over this I cannot understand as they managed for Building Control services for construction. the bit I worked on was borough wise in Hackney but one BCO we had was from Tower Hamlets and another from Newham.

sheer lunacy

Drapers field summed up a lot of the "legacy" for me. This was supposed to be a temporary decommission of a very popular playing field and I think it is only just now coming back into use. I don't know what the delay was about, but I do know that local schools and clubs used those fields for sports and had the facility shut since September 2011. The initial 18 months it was supposed to be out of action turned into around 2.5 years.
 
Without any fanfare or prominent signage, an off-road cycling and walking bypass of the dangerous Lea Interchange has opened up in East London.

For riders heading west from Waltham Forest the route avoids the multiple traffic lanes and crossings where a cyclist was killed at the Lea Interchange during the London 2012 games.

http://lcc.org.uk/articles/secret-route-bypassing-the-dangerous-lea-interchange-opens-in-east-london

This route passes south of the Velopark and ultimately ends in ramp leading to a barrier in front of the four lane Waterden Road that connects with the Westfield shopping centre. It is unclear what, if any, further connection will be provided for walkers and cyclists.

This is where it ends:

in_content.JPG
 
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