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A417 Petition The petition to downgrade the A 417 to a B road (now known officially as the ‘A 2 B campaign’) is now building up a good head of steam. At the end of February, the four principal players in the campaign (the District Councillors representing the local wards through which the A417 passes plus our County Councillor) held a public meeting in Fairford to officially launch the campaign. There has been a good deal of local press interest in the petition. The Standard and The Echo have both covered it and there has also been comment on Radio Gloucestershire. The aim of the petition is to get the road removed from the principal lorry routes system as this affects lorry movements not only of UK based hauliers but also those from across Europe. Clearly, it will not remove all lorry traffic because there is a good deal of local lorry use. The hope is that it will divert long distance lorries from using a route which, particularly from the point of view of Poulton and Fairford, is simply not suitable for such traffic. Road maintenance has been raised as a potential problem but there are no indications that downgrading will have a deleterious impact as maintenance is based on the state of the roads and not their usage. Cutting lorry volumes should extend surface life; the amount of wear and tear done by a heavy haulage lorry is estimated to be 100 times that of a car. Moreover, the changed status will alter minimum requirements such as dimensions and thereby should allow greater flexibility for other traffic management and risk reduction strategies. The local petition kicks off in April and will run to the end of May. Anybody who is over 18 and living in the villages will be entitled to put their name to the petition which will subsequently be handed to Cotswold District Council. Within Ampney Crucis, there are 15 volunteers who will be coming to your door and inviting you to sign the petition forms. For Ampney St Peter and Ampney St Mary, Mrs Rhonda Thompson will be the sole distributor. She will refer to the respective co-ordinators (Julian Selby-Rickards and Nicoll Ferguson) and will co-opt other collectors if appropriate. The co-ordinators will meet in early April to assess progress and to oversee the conduct of the campaign.
Find out More about our RoadsDo you know how to find out about current road works or how decisions are made about new speed limits? Because people in Gloucestershire have been asking more questions about traffic management and highway maintenance, the County Council has now produced very useful leaflets on both subjects. For your free copies contact Sharon JonesÉ 01452 425525 or email projectsandtraffic@gloucestershire.gov.uk |
