ePetition - Close Wolstonbury Road off to through traffic

Wolstonbury Road has for a number of years been used as a cut-through by a sizeable number of drivers who are determined to avoid queuing at the Dyke Road / Old Shoreham Road junction. This cut-through traffic flows throughout the day and evening and includes vehicles of all sizes, many travelling at speed. The road has become unnecessarily noisy and dangerous. It is also becoming increasingly difficult for residents to park near their properties as the road is also used both as an overspill car park for BHASVIC and as a student drop-off point.

1) Our residents last petitioned the council on these matters in 2004. These problems have though continued to increase and have been greatly exacerbated both by the ongoing expansion of BHASVIC and the re-configuration of the Seven Dials traffic infrastructure which aimed to calm traffic in the area. A downside of this re-configuration has been the ever increasing use of Wolstonbury Road as a cut-through. The road is the first open road next to the junction with Dyke Road as well opening onto Highdown Road. Being the most readily accessible, the road bears the burden of almost all of the cut-through traffic avoiding the Dyke Road / Old Shoreham Road junction in both directions. It also has a disproportionate number of non-residents parking in it, primarily BHASVIC related. The nuisance, disturbance and danger to our residents, especially our small children and elderly neighbours, is self evident.

2) We note that the Council approved the construction of a teaching block on a BHASVIC car park without consulting the residents in the area and this opened in 2015. School parking permits were then issued to teachers who have since been using Wolstonbury Road as their default car park. Indeed, the BHASVIC website encourages visitors to the college to use metered parking in our area so the road is also the default overspill car park for their visitors and students. Closing the road would undoubtedly distribute the pressure to park locally more evenly throughout the other roads in our neighbourhood.

3) Wolstonbury Road was designed for the benefit of its residents. The primary advantages of closing the road off relate to the quality of life in the road for all residents, especially the young and elderly, and the general improvement in our sense of community. The adjoining parallel roads, Chanctonbury Road and Caburn Road, are both quiet cul-de-sacs and often have children playing out in them. This never happens in Wolstonbury Road.

4) If our area were a new build, no planning authority would permit a developer to build houses with a street pattern and traffic movements like Wolstonbury Road. It does not lead to or from anywhere and the only reason to keep it open appears to be that the Council considers its primary use to be not as a residential street but as a cut-through to diffuse the traffic at the Dyke Road / Old Shoreham Road junction. The Council's Principal Transport Planner has acknowledged this. This is not sufficient reason to keep Wolstonbury Road exposed and is directly contrary to the wishes of our long suffering residents who must submit day and night to the policy's ill effects.

5) The Highdown Road area is a small, discrete residential area with few traffic movements of its own. The minor additional traffic movements resulting from road closure would be more than compensated by the loss of cut-through traffic.

6) We understand that the cost of works involved in closing the road off is not considered significant. This issue has over very many years undermined the quality of the lives of our residents and detrimentally affected the safety of the more vulnerable members of our community. The BHASVIC related parking revenue the Council has received to the detriment of the residents could now be allocated towards resolving these serious issues.

7) The office of Peter Kyle MP has recommended the above proposed solution and is supported by Councillor Jackie O’Quin

This ePetition ran from 21/12/2017 to 22/01/2018 and has now finished.

162 people signed this ePetition.