Campaign to improve Warmley road safety

A campaign has been launched to improve road safety on the A420 in Warmley.

Conservative councillor for the Siston and Warmley ward, Ian Adams, has started an e-petition on South Gloucestershire Council’s website to tackle several local road safety issues that have been raised by concerned residents.

Opposite Warmley Community Centre, there have been reports of a number of near misses on the pedestrian crossing on the A420 Deanery Road because, during busy periods, drivers exiting the Esso garage – which also incorporates a Tesco convenience store – concentrate on looking right towards the Ring Road roundabout when trying to find a gap in the traffic and often fail to notice that the pedestrian crossing lights have turned red up ahead.

The second issue involves the merging of traffic into Deanery Road coming off the Ring Road during busy times, where traffic wanting to enter the garage site queues back onto Deanery Road and onto the Ring Road.

In those circumstances, traffic wanting to travel eastwards along Deanery Road are either forced to wait, which causes congestion, or they overtake, causing traffic travelling in the opposite direction to brake or wait, which causes congestion in the other direction.

During less busy times, some drivers use the right-hand lane as a dual carriageway in an attempt to over take rather than merge, which means the speed of these drivers is in excess of the 30mph speed limit as they approach the pedestrian crossing.

Thirdly, residents have raised concerns about the speed of traffic traveling from Bridgeyate or from the Ring Road and are calling for a review of the existing signage and control measures to make them more effective, including better speed enforcement.

Cllr Adams said:

“There are a number of accidents waiting to happen in this part of Warmley whether it’s traffic backing up onto the ring road, speeding motorists or drivers failing to see pedestrians as they exit the garage and convenience store site.

This campaign aims to raise awareness of these issues and the need for some action to be taken.

I would encourage local people to add their names to the online petition so we can demonstrate the strength of feeling that something needs to be done.”