Croydon Council has had £2m of transport funding frozen after removing protective wands separating cyclists from traffic along a cycle lane that Transport for London (TfL) had helped fund.
The freeze was triggered when TfL spotted on the borough's mayor's Instagram account that the wands on London Road had been dismantled.
TfL said the council had acted without its consent, and has warned other boroughs against doing the same. It said funding would resume once the council had repaid the £234,917 it had spent on the scheme since 2020-21.
The borough's Conservative mayor Jason Perry said the scheme had endangered cyclists and blocked emergency vehicles. He said the council had agreed to repay.
'Unlawfully removed it'
Perry had posted that the Conservative-led council had removed the wands on Instagram in May, saying they were impeding local roads, causing congestion, limiting bus movements and, in some cases, holding up emergency vehicles.
He had raised similar concerns in 2024 when the authority took out wands along Brighton Road after complaints from businesses that they restricted parking bays and created trip hazards.
Croydon councillor Alasdair Stewart, the cabinet member for streets and enforcement, said: "Jason Perry and Conservative councillors were elected to listen to residents, not rubber-stamp schemes they have made clear over many years they do not want. We will continue standing up for their priorities."
However, Croydon West's Labour MP, Sarah Jones, said: "Funding for safer crossings, better bus journeys, improved cycling infrastructure and road improvements has now been put on hold because of the mayor's catastrophic failure to work constructively with TfL."
The scheme had received the £234,917 through TfL's Local Implementation Plan (LIP), which shares funding across all 32 London boroughs, with boroughs bidding for the money to pay for local transport and road safety schemes.
Croydon is revising its LIP submission at TfL's request and has committed to repaying the full amount.
The funding will be released once TfL has reviewed the new submission and confirmed it meets the fund's requirements.
London's walking and cycling commissioner, Will Norman, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: "Boroughs cannot use public funding to deliver a scheme and then unlawfully decide to remove it."
He added: "This should send a clear message to all boroughs, if you accept TfL funding, we expect you to deliver the projects that funding was intended to support and follow the legal processes."