Staffordshire County Council aims to encourage more children to walk to school to reduce car dependency and to make communities healthier, greener and more pleasant. This ambition is only realistic and feasible if pedestrian routes are made safer.
The road is also used by members of the community attending the local Community Life Church and students returning home from Kingsmead High School during hours when the crossing patrol are not on duty.
This is a busy residential area, and the route provides access for people from Wimblebury to walk to the local supermarket in Heath Hayes and the new Designer Outlet Village as well as the general public going about their daily business.
The nearest pedestrian crossing being opposite St Johns Church a significant detour for residents. The diversion to the crossing is a significant distance for those on foot, especially for children and disabled residents and entails the crossing of other busy side streets. People therefore cross this busy section of Hednesford Road opportunistically on a regular basis. The existing crossing is now thoroughly inadequate for local demand, for changing demographics and lifestyles, and for the geography of local housing, amenities, and school catchments.
High volume of traffic travels along this route connecting Heath
Hayes with Hednesford and Norton Canes and this has also increased
following the opening of Cannock Chase Crematorium and the Designer
Outlet Village.
We therefore call upon the Council to help by installing a
pedestrian crossing near Five Ways Primary School, Hednesford Road
to make local walking routes safer, shorter and easier.
Started by: Christie Gray (Local Resident)
This ePetition ran from 22/02/2022 to 05/04/2022 and has now finished.
Nobody signed this ePetition.
I refer to the petition, signed by local residents regarding the request for the pedestrian crossing outside Five Ways Primary School. I can advise you that receipt of the petition will be reported to Councillor Samantha Thompson.
Staffordshire has one of the safest county council road networks
in the country, but we welcome and encourage feedback from
communities in relation to matters surrounding road safety.
The County Council receives a vast number of requests for
improvements to the highway network and the Divisional Highway
Programme brings all of these together with a view to prioritizing
local issues for further investigation and/or action.
The Council has no plans to consider installing a pedestrian crossing at this time, the costs associated with providing a pedestrian crossing are high, with estimations costing in excess of a £100k.
The vast majority of local issues recorded onto the DHP are regarding road safety and there are a number of measures that can be considered to address these concerns including: Road Safety Education in schools; speed enforcement initiatives and small scale engineering works.
This request will be discussed with Cllr Thompson at the
earliest opportunity.