Making town's streets safer
Published on 25th October 2007 in Letters
Sir - whilst I welcome any initiative to improve cycle safety, a police campaign to clamp down on cyclists using footpaths may not be the most safety-conscious message. As in all UK towns and cities, cyclists get a raw deal, and cycling on Goole's roads is particularly hazardous. Motorways, railway crossings, flyovers, bridges, heavy industry, HGVs and the all too familiar congestion in the town centre make Goole a special case.
Reported in your paper last week, the town has £400,000 to improve the safety of pedestrians and cyclists. Obviously any funding is welcome but in reality this is a mere drop in the ocean. If we are serious about road safety then a blanket speed limit of 20 mph across the town must be looked at. A reduction in speed would not make roads safer but has to be more cost effective and rather less of a hindrance than bollards and speed bumps.
Another saving would be to stop the painting of seemingly indiscriminate cycle lanes. The markings along Bridge Street do little to promote confidence. As for the new multimillion-pound gateway into Goole (Guardian Glass roundabout), the provision for pedestrians and cyclist is probably best described as an after thought. As a keen cyclist I am all too aware that Goole must do much more to improve safety.
Unfortunately responses/ideas for road safety were required by the 19th, the day after the press release. Perhaps our views are not really that important.
On the other hand. if we have any councillors, (Goole or East Riding), local police or road safety planners who wish to take a cycle tour and look at what are alarmingly dangerous issues, then I would be happy to oblige.
CYCLIST
(Name and address supplied
Sir - In regard to East Riding of Yorkshire Council's £400,000 traffic-calming scheme for Goole: only in the topsy-turvy world of the ERYC could such massive expenditure plans be announced and then, as an afterthought, are affected residents asked what they think.
Surely such residents should be consulted on their views first and then, if at all, should such proposals be given the go ahead. Just maybe local council-tax payers would prefer to see some of this money spent on, say, better street cleaning or on the removal of graffiti which blights much of this town, rather than on grandiose traffic-calming schemes, which incidentally will increase vehicle congestion/pollution.
To me the ERYC also show their contempt for local democracy by giving minimal notice for affected residents to register their protests and in a further bid to deter any opposition, we see pictures of our caring representatives posing sympathetically with tiny schoolchildren in the interests of safety (It's strange, but I don't recall the vast majority of these councillors being too interested in the safety of the children of Pasture Road Primary School when the ERYC closed it down, forcing many children to cross busy roads in order to attend their distant new schools).
The ERYC are also rushing through plans to install speed bumps on Western Road - the main route for emergency vehicles travelling to and from Goole Hospital. Every second can be vital for critically-ill patients and the obvious concern here is of delays to ambulances etc. and the potential loss of lives.
Back to the drawing board on this particular scheme at least, ERYC!
RESIDENT
(Name and address supplied)
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