Mixed response to shelving of Croydon Tramlink extension

12:22pm Thursday 13th November 2008

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SHELVING a £170m plan to extend the Croydon Tramlink into Crystal Palace has been met with mixed reaction.

Mayor of London Boris Johnson has postponed plans for trams to run from Harrington Road in Croydon through to Anerley and Crystal Palace.

Plans were dropped along with more than £3b worth of other transport projects across the capital, due to a lack of funding.

Instead money will be invested in improving the Tube, introducing a Routemaster bus, and the Crossrail project to build a railway across London.

Sue Nagle, founder of Triangle Traders, which represents traders in Crystal Palace, says shopowners desperately need the tram line to be extended to the area.

She said: “I interviewed every trader in the area, and 75 out of 76 traders asked, said they wanted the Tramlink.

“It is a way of bringing customers up here without the need of parking.

“Without Tramlink we will lose shops. The area is in decline and we are in desperate need of Tramlink.”

Out of 1,520 responses to public consultation over the plan to extend the Tramlink held last year, there were more than twice as many positive comments as negative ones.

The new tram line, which would have been built by 2013, currently runs in the borough as far as Beckenham and Elmers End.

But members of the Crystal Palace Park Community Association are pleased by the Mayor’s decision as it would have meant the tram cutting through the park.

Chairman John Payne said: “It would set a wrong precedent for parks.

“Would it bring increased benefits to the area? It's far more likely to take people away to Croydon than bring them to Crystal Palace.

“Our roads are not suitable for trams.”

Speaking at People's Question Time in Bromley on November 6, the London Mayor said he had taken a tough decision but the right one.

He said: “I could have gone on with this charade but to do that would mean wasting millions and millions of pounds on consultants and planners.

“I thought it would be better to be up front with people.”