WESTBURY town councillors have suggested that a new road could be created on the north side of the playing fields at Matravers School as a way to combat the traffic and parking issues at Springfield Road that have been rumbling on for years.
The suggested road would connect to the Warminster Road car park in town, but when these plans were first discussed eight years ago, they were turned down by the school. Town councillors are now recommending that Wiltshire Council revisits this idea.
Two members of the public who are long-term residents of Springfield Road came to a meeting of the town council’s highways, planning, and development committee last month to raise the parking and traffic issues in the area with the local council. The residents, who have lived there for 40 years, say the area experiences an unnecessary amount of traffic during school pick up and drop off times as parents drop children at the gates, despite being told not to. They also say that sixth formers often park in front of the residents’ houses despite having an allocated car park, which creates stress for the families living on the street as they say they cannot park elsewhere nearby.
The residents in question have previously put in planning permission to excavate the grass bank outside their homes, opposite the school, to install electric vehicle charging points and off-road parking as a way to alleviate the parking issues, but this was rejected by Wiltshire Council as they claim to not know who owns this section of land.
Wiltshire Council has said that the grass bank is not recorded as belonging to the authority on their mapping system and that it would be for the applicant to approach the land registry to establish ownership. The residents at the meeting say that the land is theirs on their deeds.
Speaking at the meeting, cllr Mike Sutton said, “We have put forward at least three or four schemes over the years for this area, which have all been turned down by Wiltshire Council; we have no powers in making things like that happen, we can only suggest what to do.
“We had no comments about the excavation plans when they came to us, we just asked Wiltshire if they could do this, to which they said, ‘No’, because they are not sure about who owns that bit of land.
“One of the things we always come up against when we discuss parking issues in Westbury is that the law of the land is that the streets are available for everybody to park on. There have been schemes in this area however and one of the ideas we took to Wiltshire Council was to make the area a one-way system, but that was turned down. We have had a number of discussions with the school to see if they can help and those discussions have not been particularly constructive or productive.”
Speaking to the residents who attended the meeting, cllr Gordon King added, “We saw your application to cut into the grass banks in order to put in electric vehicle charging points and we thought that for the very first time, somebody had brought something to the table that was innovative and could solve the problems in that particular road. The situation at Springfield Road has been growing for more than 40 years and quite clearly, change is required either in the way the road is configured, or the way the traffic comes into the school.
“We put a plan to Matravers School about eight years ago for the creation of a new road which would cross the school field at the very north and come out onto Warminster Road car park, but the school totally rejected that view. We will continue to press the school to re-visit that plan because as far as I can see, that would be the best possible solution. This is a very difficult problem, and it will need to take time for it to be resolved.”
The HP&D committee agreed to recommend to the town council that they should ask Wiltshire Council and Matravers to reconsider the old plans that would see the construction of a new road to link to Warminster Road car park from the north side of Matravers School fields. They also suggested the town council should ask Wiltshire councillor, Matt Dean, to speak to the unitary authority to discuss the land ownership issue of the grass banks.
The new road plans that were originally put to the school in 2014, concentrated on alleviating the problem of multiple school buses crowding Springfield Road at the beginning and at the end of the school day.
Councillors’ site visit
Following last month’s town council meeting, cllr Gordon King and cllr Matt Dean have met with the business manager and highways engineer of Wiltshire Council in Springfield Road.
Cllr King said, “We resolved to ask the highways area office to have the highways restriction markings and ‘caution young people in the road’ markings repainted as they were worn and, in some cases, disappeared. In addition, the red hatched walkway requires repainting / resurfacing urgently. We also asked if consideration could be given to repainting the parking bays, not least because parking was haphazard and inconsistent throughout, with wide spaces between some, whilst in other places, cars were tightly packed in.
“In the short term, this will help motorists know where, and where not to park, provide greater security to pedestrians and provide a more efficient parking regime. In the long-term, negotiations may be required with landowners to give up strips of land that will enable the construction of a new pavement to replace much [but not all] of the red walkway, further enhancing the safety of pedestrians. It should be remembered that the overwhelming majority of Matravers students actually walk to and from school, they are not dropped off or picked up.
“However, there is no doubt that Springfield Road does suffer vehicular stress, but that is mainly when the school has events or extracurricular activity but, as annoying for some as that may be, such disruption would normally occupy a very short part of any day. Matravers School is a very important part of our community infrastructure and will inevitably in such a tight space as Springfield Road cause disruption now and again, which is regrettable for everyone concerned.”
Cllr King added that councillors support residents who wish to provide their own parking space and electric vehicle charging points. He said, “Assistance has been offered and accepted in the form of pre-application advice to those who had previously made a planning application should they wish to resubmit a new plan, however it was pointed out that there would need to be a clear difference between the former plan and any new plan. We wish them every success.”
