Children’s route to school over railway line is unsafe warn councillors

A SAFER pedestrian crossing is needed over Westbury railway line  from the Station Road housing estate, the town council has stressed, over  fears it is an accident waiting to happen. 

Town councillors are concerned that children will have to cross the railway to get to school. 

Westbury Junior School is worried that the only route to the school from the new 300-home estate at Station Road was to  cross the railway line at the manned and light-operated crossing, said cllr Ian Cunningham, chair of the town council’s highways, planning & development committee at a meeting on the 21st September.

Members were replying to Wiltshire Council’s highway team who wrote “… as long as the safety controls installed on the existing railway crossing are properly observed, there should be no risk for pedestrians.”

But councillors disagreed and called for urgent action.

Cllr Sheila Kimmins added, “We need a bridge desperately. In the interim period, we could have gates that actually lock when the trains are coming

“The new electric trains are quiet so you won’t always hear them coming, and if children start going across, it’s not going to help.  We can’t deal with this and need to keep on at Wiltshire Council.”

Cllr Ward Jones said, “Here we are, yet another issue to do with safety – and nobody’s taking it seriously  in  terms of producing an answer

“There may not  be a problem at the moment, that’s fine, but the estate  is hardly up and running. They reckon there will be more families and more children crossing 

“We all know that whatever you do in theory has got to work in practice, so we actually need something  there sooner rather than later. We need to press and press hard.”

Cllr Brenda Pyne stated, “I agree, we need to do something. If there’s a possibility of having some gates across, that at least would help, and perhaps we should try to find out what that would involve in cost and effort. 

“Once the estate is up and running, there is going to be a heavier footfall going across the crossing and it’s really an accident waiting to happen, which  would be tragic. We need to try and avoid that if we possibly can.”

Councillor Cunningham updated members about a previous meeting with the school and Network Rail representatives. “Wiltshire Council is saying they don’t think there’s a problem and Network Rail weren’t keen to do anything,” explained cllr Cunningham, “There was a suggestion  about the fact you can have a gated crossing,” he said.

“I think everyone  thought a footbridge was going to be far too expensive because of the huge ramps that would be needed for access for pushchairs and wheelchairs and the like,  but there was a discussion where somebody said you can get the gate version where the gate locks and doesn’t let you in when the level crossing lights are on.” 

Cllr Nick Pyne said, “The only way across the track is to use that light controlled crossing, which is not really suitable for schoolchildren. We’ve got to push hard to get the bridge built because it solves so many problems.”

Cllr Cunningham responded, “Network Rail said the schoolchildren are safe and there isn’t a problem with them crossing. I think it is still a problem, and obviously the bridge would be one solution.”

He added, “Network Rail would be keen to close the crossing  entirely because they don’t like them, but they can’t do that with no other route across.”

Cllr Gordon King said, “If the council and Network Rail are washing their hands of this and saying they do not see the problem while we do, then we could commission our own solution and through our CIL (Community Infrastructure Levy)  money to fund it, and shame them.”

The town council had already written to  Wiltshire Council asking them to confirm they were happy with the situation and that in the event of an accident would they take responsibility.

Wiltshire Council responded that they are happy with the situation and said the housing estate developers did not want to pay for a bridge.

Cllr Mike Sutton told the meeting, “I hear what people are saying. There’s very little we could do apart from pay for the bridge because Network Rail are a unitary body in themselves and they don’t have to do anything except what they want to in law and they certainly wouldn’t let anyone build or do anything on a railway line.

“Our only option would be the bridge, that we can’t afford.

“This is our end point. We ought to document it and  say to all parties we are not happy and it’s an abrogation of responsibility and we’ll keep it on record in case anything should happen.”

Members agreed a proposal by cllr Cunningham to express their disappointment about the safety of the crossing in a formal letter to Wiltshire Council and at another meeting to list the installation of a gate as an item agenda.