As many residents who live in Wheelton and Withnell will be aware from our newsletters and conversations with Andrew Snowden, the Conservative Spokesman for the area, we are currently running a campaign about ‘hotspots’ for dangerous driving, and trying to identify solutions with the relevant authorities, as it is a concern of many people in those communities.
This campaign has highlighted two spots on the A674 Bolton Road, one at the junction at the top of Victoria Street (Near the Dressers) and also further up the road through Higher Wheelton. The primary concern being speeding, but at the Dressers junction visibility of on-coming vehicles when pulling out, due to overgrown hedges, is also a concern.
Abbey Village has a number of issues with speeding through the village and near misses on the zebra crossing, which Andrew is campaigning to be turned into a full Pelican crossing. This speeding also continues down Railway Road in Brinscall, where cars have been damaged from careless driving as the road is a ‘rat run’ with cars reaching very high speeds.
In Withnell there is a major issue on Bury Lane, with drivers mounting the curb and driving at high speed down the pavement. This is extremely dangerous and reckless driving, and has resulted in near misses with Children leaving their front gardens, who are two small to see over the wall as to whether a car is driving on the pavement.
Andrew has spoken to many local residents, trying to identify possible solutions. The vast majority of residents are in favour of single wooden bollards installed 20 foot or so apart, to prevent cars driving the full length of pavement at speed, but still allow access, and the ability to mount the curb if required to allow on coming vehicles past.
Knowing how tight funds are, Andrew has worked with local business to find ways of reducing the cost burden on the Highways Agency, in a hope to resolve this before anyone gets hurt. Derek Fox and Sons have very generously agreed to donate upto 8 highway standard bollards to Andrew’s campaign, which would vastly minimise the cost to the Highways Agency.
Andrew wrote to the highway authorities, who already have a case open on this issue due to a high volume of calls from residents, and they have been back in touch to say that until someone is seriously hurt, and as such appears in their statistics, they will not install the bollards. They said the bollards would restrict wheel chair / pram access, and would cost too much.
Andrew Said “Both reasons are completely wrong, and we will be pursuing this further with the Conservative Groups on the Borough and County Council. The costs are massively reduced due to the free bollards I have secured, and as for the restricted access; I have taken a photo with a suitable sized wooden post, inserted to the highways authories very own dimensions, and as you can see it would have no access restriction.”