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• Reference: 2002/0079-1
• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

How much transport grant from TfL did local authorities bid for in the coming year, 2003/04? How much is being allocated to them? .

• Reference: 2002/0080-1
• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

Will you increase the budget for the boroughs for 2003/4 at least in line with the proportional increase in the total allocated to Transport for London by the Government? .

• Reference: 2002/0102-1
• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

Can TfL assist Croydon council in carrying out a proper monitoring scheme measuring the impacts of the Crystal Palace/Upper Norwood one way system, on the people living and working in the area. This should include: ·- any rise in traffic in surrounding residential roads; ·- impacts on the number of road casualties; ·- impacts on air quality; - community severance and impacts on businesses in the Triangle area Can you offer local people any timescale for when this scheme would be reviewed? .

• Reference: 2002/0103-1
• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

Have you considered approaching the insurance industry to discuss London buses being given immunity for payouts involving vehicles illegally using bus lanes? .

• Reference: 2002/0104-1
• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

Do you share my concern that current TfL forecasts show that the boroughs will underspend by 10% on both their allocation for road safety (£2.5m underspend) and for walking/cycling (£1m underspend). Do you feel that this is due to any of the following: 1 the previous lack of consistency and security of funding in the past? 2 the difficulty of some boroughs to recruit sufficient staff to spend the money? 3 a failure of some boroughs to take these policy areas seriously and gear up for expansion? Can you provide a breakdown by borough of the projected underspenders? .

• Question by: Darren Johnson
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

On consultation, the fact that most of the infrastructure for Orbirail is in place - it would be a very cheap and efficient scheme to implement - it could give you an easy time as Mayor in terms of the consultation process on that. You would be unlikely to have rooms of rabid car drivers attacking your plans.

• Question by: Victor Anderson
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

That is an encouraging answer. During the first six months of the GLA, when you had your policy commissions, I went to an interesting meeting about what's become the draft London Plan, where Professor Peter Hall and Nicky Gavron spoke about Orbirail and the idea that this would be a key part of your Spatial Development Strategy, that you would have an orbital rail route joining up inner-city areas, and then you would have interchanges between that route and the radial routes coming out from Central London. The phrase that was used was `the city of interchange" because London was...

• Question by: Victor Anderson
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

It's proceeding but it doesn't seem to have the prominence in the draft London Plan that other transport schemes have. Orbirail doesn't appear on the London diagram in the draft London Plan; there's a list of major transport schemes with their timing and it doesn't appear on that; in the Options Appraisal document for the Plan, it's not listed amongst the major projects. It's not up there with Crossrail and Thameslink 2000; it is excluded from those even though it looked like the most important of the schemes that the Plan was going to move on.

• Question by: Victor Anderson
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

How do you think Orbirail compares for cost effectiveness with the other transport infrastructure schemes that you've got? Crossrail is estimated to cost between £6-£10 billion, whereas Orbirail, if you already have the East London Line extension, is only supposed to cost something like 3% of that amount. In cost effectiveness terms, Orbirail ought to be the top of your list.

• Question by: Victor Anderson
• Meeting date: 16 October 2002

Doesn't that make it more important that you put it at the top of your list because, surely, your criteria should be different to the Treasury's? Orbirail is going to benefit people in London, particularly in inner-city areas, whereas Crossrail is largely about people getting from Heathrow Airport to the City. There are far less stops for people in London on the Crossrail plans than there will be on the Orbirail plans. The idea of measuring the benefits of a transport scheme through productivity, is biased against poorer people who are going to earn lower incomes. The Treasury's figures are...