HOW much slower than gridlock do the people calling for more traffic calming in Bradford on Avon want?
Congestion causes more asthma and pollution-related diseases than free-flowing traffic.
Already in the 0.9 of a mile from the top of Masons’ Lane to the Sainsbury’s roundabout there are the following traffic calming strategies, ie causes of congestion: each and every lorry, coach, bus, caravan, vehicle too large to allow two-way traffic through Market Street (and drivers too scared to enter narrow stretch); single-lane bottleneck on the Frome road, large vehicles using river and canal bridges, two mini roundabouts, two pedestrian crossings, recycling collection, traffic waiting to turn, and currently four weeks’ road works outside The Canal Tavern.
No one chooses or wants to drive through Bradford on Avon. Traffic calming is an oxymoron; it causes stress, misery and road rage daily for people trying to get to work, provide welfare services, deliver goods and services and simply trying to get from A to B.
Britain is 30 per cent less productive than other countries such as France because of our poor infrastructure. The bottle-nosing of traffic through the town is a prime example of this. Traffic enters the town and gets stuck there, chugging out poisonous emissions.
Unless population, commerce, welfare services and tourism decrease in this area, the volume of traffic will not. It will continue to enter the town and get stuck there, emitting its poisonous gases. The solution is not to congest the town further. A bypass is clearly the only solution but in the meantime a one-way system would help the free flow of traffic. This has been called for numerous times. It would be cheap and effective. So who is stopping it?
Megan Peters
Stowford Cottages
Wingfield