Graham reports back from Friends of Scholes Park meeting
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by Lib Dem Team on 8 December, 2016
Following concern from local residents and requests from the Lib Dem team, the Police have visited the Barnes Hospital site and also ticketed a number of contractor vehicles parked illegally on the South Park Road Estate.
“Residents on the estate should not have to put up with their roads being parked up by contractors,” said Iain. “The estate is ‘no entry apart from access’ and that should’t include parking up to go to work somewhere else.”
“Thank you to the Police for taking this action. I understand they’ll be back to check up over the coming weeks,” Iain added.
17 Comments
Good for the cops. Hopefully, on their next visit, they’ll hang around the underpass for a while and ticket some interlopers.
Don’t be daft! Why would they possibly do that? This is good though: The sales people at the Barns (you know, that landlocked massive residential development on Kingsway) are telling purchasers who ask how to get into Manchester from there by car to use the South Park Estate! That’s nice of them. Therefore the assurances I was given at the planning meeting (by councilors and the planning officer) that this wouldnt happen wasn’t the truth! Another planning cock-up.
Robert
Or, of course, anyone wanting to go from Barnes towards Manchester could simply use the “cut through”, across the central reservation, that’s always been there and is designed for exactly that purpose.
John,
Some years ago you could also turn right out of Broadway onto Kingsway, but have a number of accidents, it was closed off.
The same will happen outside Barnes, or they’ll have to install Traffic lights
I believe that the local authority need to install a traffic camera on the slip road beyond Mardale Drive. This would identify those vehicles using the underpass from the M60 as a short cut. I spoke to one of the police officers who was issuing fixed penalty notices earlier this week. He said that Stockport is one of the only councils not to install a camera at a well known traffic infringement point. Says a lot about our council doesn’t it. If we can get rid of the cut through traffic and contractor vehicles parked on the pavements it will drastically reduce the on going litter problem. Perhaps it’s time we considered setting up a local action group as we appear not to be getting anywhere with the problem, especially if the Barnes estate traffic also decide to cut through the estate.
Hi Stephen – I’ve had a look at this and I’m not aware of any other local councils that have installed cameras at this sort of location. However, we have asked council officers to look into whether its possible.
Be awful if some cars broke down under the bridge……..
I’m really glad that something has been done about this. We had in the range of 12 to 15 cars parked up at the front of our estate from 7am often till 6 at night. The workers have told me that the manager of the building works has told them park on this estate. They park on the pavements so you can’t walk down on them and have to step into the road. One fellow parked his van in such a way that he could only get into it through the passenger door.
Regarding Robert’s comment – I can confirm that potential buyers are being told to use the South Park estate to gain access to the M60. The other option, I was informed, was turn right out of Barnes and then then for the M60 by turning right at Didsbury and then on to the large roundabout near the pyramid. Guess which one the residents will use.
Incidentally one day last week when walking back from Cheadle I saw three vehicles do a U-turn at the junction. One actually turned on Kingsway and the other two near Torkington.
Just wait until Barnes is fully occupied.
You must be completely wrong, as the LibDem Cllrs have assured us, many times, that there will not be a problem.
Iain,
I simply typed ‘councils with rat run cameras’ into my web browser and the following came up.
The Telegraph website:
Rat-running motorists face fines
Motorists who use “rat runs” could be traced and fined after number-plate recognition cameras were installed on a busy shortcut in a scheme approved by the Department for Transport.
Drivers making unauthorised shortcuts are being threatened with a £45 penalty under what is believed to be the first scheme of its kind in the country.
It is being enforced at Addenbrooke’s hospital in Cambridge, where cameras have been installed at both ends of a road running through the grounds.
This has been done by Cambridgeshire County Council, with the restrictions being enforced by Cambridgeshire Police.
Gloucestershire Live website:
Rat running drivers have been monitored in Nailsworth ahead of potentially major changes to access, and a blanket 20mph limit.
The Gloucestershire County Council cameras sprang up around the town last week, to gather data on so-called rat runs including Jubilee Road, Star Hill, Northfields Road and Inchbrook Hill.
Nailsworth Town Council is weighing up restrictions on roads between Forest Green and Inchbrook, and is pressing for a 20mph limit in the town.
Town mayor Jonathan Duckworth said some residents living in those roads wanted more done to stop them being used as regular routes which should use the A46 junction in the centre of Nailsworth.
“We asked for them to monitor movement around the narrow roads off Springhill and Nympsfield Road, so we can see which way vehicles are going,” he said.
“It’s gathering evidence so we know whether to bring in a traffic regulation order to change things.”
Read more at http://www.gloucestershirelive.co.uk/rat-run-traffic-caught-on-camera-in-gloucestershire-town/story-29525142-detail/story.html#1oh17Ktu4PYBkEFe.99
So it would appear that some councils are prepared to do something about ‘rat runs’ so why not Stockport? We pay enough in council tax so surely we could expect something in return.
Hi Stephen – I’ve not found any councils around here doing it, so I’m surprised that your Policeman suggested everyone was.
As we’ve discussed before, there seems to be one location across the country where they’re being used (in Cambridgeshire). It’s difficult to tell how well they work, but based on that evidence we’ve already asked council officers to look at whether it could work in your situation.
If Bridgfords/Countrywide is the Sales Agent for the Barnes development why not send an official letter to them instructing them to inform potential buyers that there is no access to Kingsway/A34 for Didsbury & all Northbound traffic via South Park Road Estate as it is a traffic violation and they will be ticketed.
Even if future Barnes residents obey this notification, their next opportunity to change direction will be to turn left at the lights towards Cheadle, a U-turn at the junction with Richmond Hill Road and thus swell the queue to turn right at the lights onto the A34. What chaos that will cause at peak times.
Some will try to turn right at the traffic island opposite the Barnes exit which will cause huge queues and block the A34 southbound unless a box junction is painted on the A34 at that spot.
Others wishing to join the Westbound M60 will cross over then drive across the chevrons between the East and West bound M60 slip roads causing more chaos.
The whole thing is a recipe for chaos
This problem should have been thrashed out well before planning permission was granted – this is entirely the Council’s fault.
I, personally, feel sorry for these contractors, mostly from the EU who are not familiar with the area and have only followed their Site Manager’s directions. The developers have enough land on sire to dedicate some to a car park for their contractors. I have lived on the South Park Road Estate for more than 42 years and it is now a nightmare for all residents, mainly because the police have refused to ‘police’ the drivers (who are using it as a short cut/rat-run) as they used to do. A further annoyance is the resulting condition of the road surface on the Kingsway slip road, Mardale, South Park Road itself and Coniston, it is a patchwork of cheap, short term patches and it is like driving in a Third World country to the detriment of our vehicles. Why could not the whole estate have been resurfaced at the same time as Brentwood? Was that road ‘special’ because it was part of the phantom cycle track which no one uses?
We have paid enough Council Tax over the years to have a better service than we are getting.
Please stop patting yourselves on the back with vague promises from Transport departments and get something done. As you readily admit, it will only get worse as more houses are built at Handforth Dean and traffic flow increases in both directions.
Pat, you are 100% right, it is beyond understanding how this development got the go ahead. I can only assume it was a ‘political’ decision.
The LibDem Cllrs have consistently criticised Cheshire East for their proposed developments not taking the transport network into consideration, yet approved this mad scheme.
Anyone with local knowledge would have realised that this scheme will bring further chaos to an already difficult junction. Our local Cllrs have said that taken action that mitigated against the impact of this development, but we all know that, that is nonsense and bordering on a blatant lie (I don’t call a few cycle lane as mitigation)
I will wager that the same LibDems Cllrs that approved this development will be wringing there hands and looking for someone else to blame in the years to come.
I concur with the all the above comments, especially those of Stephen Wilkinson.
It seems to me that the Council is leaving itself wide open to a class action for a Judicial Review for potentially not making a decision not to take appropriate measures including, amongst other things, not agreeing to install “rat-run” cameras.
Is there any appetite for a class action?
The second word “not” in the second line of the second paragraph, should have been deleted!
The above says it all