On Saturday 3^rd April MP Fleur Anderson will team up with local rowing organisations and constituents to protest and call for the Transport Secretary to fund the restoration of Hammersmith Bridge.  

There will boats out on the river at 3pm and a big banner for residents to sign in protest from 1pm – 4pm. 

Fleur Anderson said: “Hammersmith Bridge is so dangerous that the Putney Boat Race won’t be in Putney for the first time since the Second World War. The bridge must be fixed by next year’s boat race weekend and that means the Transport Secretary must fund the repair work urgently.  

Putney residents are furious about the lack of action and we’re coming out in socially distanced force to demand funding for the bridge which affects people across London and beyond. 

I have joined forces with local MPs to repeatedly ask for a meeting with the Transport Secretary to ask for an explanation for the delays and these have been ignored. The Minister set up a ‘decisive and quick’ Task Force to sort this out last September, but there has been no task and no force and most importantly no funding.  

We need action now so that people can use the bridge once more and so that next year we aren’t in the same situation watching the race in Cambridgeshire when it should be right here on the Thames. 

The Bridge closure especially affects Putney residents as there are an estimated 4,000 additional vehicles a day coming through Putney, and considerably longer journey times. The High Street is already one of the most polluted in London, and we need the bridge to reopen to cut the traffic and clean up our air. 

Without significant and swift intervention there is little sign that the race will return to the Thames anytime soon. Fleur is calling for the plan submitted by Hammersmith and Fulham Council to be expedited so that the boat race can be brought back and the travel misery for local residents can end.”