Kerbside project tackles traffic and pollution

LCC students helped to deliver designs to make streets in Southwark greener and more pedestrian friendly.

Busy roads and heavy traffic are major issues in London, particularly in residential areas, where air pollution and parking problems affect people’s quality of life.

One strategy aimed at tackling them is to make some thoroughfares less car-friendly, with a focus on the needs of pedestrians and an emphasis on environmentally aware solutions.

Southwark Council teamed up with London College of Communication and the Living Streets charity to deliver one such scheme in East Dulwich, which has become one of South London’s most desirable neighbourhoods in recent years, leading to more traffic congestion.

Students from LCC’s BA Spatial Design course helped to come with plans to repurpose some of the area’s parking bays as miniature green spaces. This strategy serves to deter drivers from using certain streets and makes those roads greener, quieter and more pleasant for local people.

LCC places an emphasis on getting its students out of the classroom and into the wider world, gaining valuable experience by collaborating on a variety of projects with community groups, businesses, charities and social enterprise schemes.

The idea is these organisations get to tap into their imagination and creativity, harnessing it to come up with effective solutions to a range of challenges, whilst the students test their problem-solving abilities, build their network of contacts, add to their portfolios, and generally become better prepared for seeking jobs when the graduate.

Around 50 undergraduates from BA Spatial Design course worked on this project, dividing up into a dozen or so small teams to devise ways of making East Dulwich a safer, more pedestrian and environmentally friendly part of the Southwark borough.

Some of them designed a space where parents can wait for their kids as they come out from school in the afternoon, bringing them together to chat and interact, thus encouraging community ties. Another group came up with a children’s see-saw which actually generates electricity via its up-and-down motion.

Southwark Council officers came to LCC to check on work in progress and offer their opinions on the solutions being devised. The council also funded the construction of prototypes for some of the designs, and the students’ work was put on display at its offices near London Bridge.

The first phase of the collaboration went so well that a second one was launched, involving students from BA Design and Management students working on an activation and marketing campaign for the project.

American educator Samuel Butler once said: “Every man’s work, whether it be literature, or music or pictures or architecture or anything else, is always a portrait of himself.” With this project, LCC’s students painted a picture of themselves as creative, energetic and passionate about solving society’s many pressing problems.

Images courtesy of LCC and Southwark Council.