There was a surprising announcement on Tuesday by the Mayor of London, “supported by the new Government”, that he is to create a Mayoral Development Corporation to “transform Oxford Street, including turning the road into a traffic-free pedestrianised avenue” so that it can “once again become the leading retail destination in the world” (see Mayor of London and government announce bold plans to transform Oxford Street (17 September 2024).
We all know that there was a longstanding disagreement between the Mayor and the previous Conservative administration of Westminster City Council as to whether the street should be pedestrianised, his 2016 pedestrianisation scheme having been scuppered by opposition by WCC, as highway authority and therefore the relevant body to implement the proposals, in June 2018. But Labour took control of WCC in May 2022 and I’m left scratching my head as to what lies behind his announcement and its timing.
WCC’s Statement on Oxford Street (17 September 2024) reveals that the council was only informed the previous Thursday that this was on the cards. The plan would serve to frustrate the council’s own plans to redesign and improve the street.
Not only that, the council had a by-election two days after the announcement and lost one of its West End seats to the Conservatives (see Labour loses central London by-election to Tories amid row over Sadiq Khan’s Oxford Street pedestrianisation (Standard, 20 September 2024)). Was the result affected by the announcement? Well it can’t have helped, given how locally unpopular the prospect of pedestrianisation has been, with residents concerned about buses and taxis being displaced to other streets.
The Mayor’s announcement contains no information as to what the boundaries would be of the proposed Mayoral Development Corporation. I’m assuming that the main reason for designating the Corporation would be to give it the necessary planning and highways powers to deliver not just the pedestrianisation but any necessary works on surrounding streets – and is the Mayor looking to include the surrounding buildings within its area? There is no information in the public domain.
The procedure for establishing Mayoral Development Corporations is set out in sections 196 to 200 of the Localism Act 2011. The Mayor will need first to consult a number of bodies, including of course WCC, before placing it before the London Assembly, undertaking public consultation and then notifying the Secretary of State.
What funding will be made available by the Government? Again, nothing is in the public domain.
All in all this seems to me a very odd use of the Mayor’s powers to achieve a scheme which surely could have been driven through with WCC’s Labour administration with appropriate sticks and carrots. Or is the announcement itself just the waving of a big stick? Time will tell…
Simon Ricketts, 21 September 2024
Personal views, et cetera
image of Mayor’s 2016 scheme courtesy of Mayor of London
SIMONICITY 