The North Pole of Little Abington

This rather sinister black pole has adorned the junction of the A1307 and the High Street at the Abingtons for some months now.

 No, its not a relic of some medieval witch-burning site, but supposedly an up to date electronic traffic indicator that Balfour Beatty put up and then slightly forgot about.  So we have been chasing, and now the County highways team have a price for completing the job but still need a date. I'll look forward to it blinking at me as I drive - at the required 40 mph - along the A1307. 

Hopefully the Abingtons' bid for an extension to the 40 mph zone along the main road will be successful too. It will make turning off and onto the road safer. 

Local traffic improvement bids

Sustauned by tea and biscuits, a small panel of county councillors, including me, spent a total of nine hours over two days listening to - and scoring - bids from parish councils seeking funding for local traffic improvement schemes.The quality of the bids varied, from ones where a residents survey had been carried out, to demonstrate local support, and which came with realsitic costings and evidence of engagement with the county's engineers on practical matters, to - well, let's just say - proposals very much in development.

Many villages across the southern part of the county were not designed for the speed and volume of modern traffic, and there was a good debate as to what actually works - whether displays that show your speed have any effect on people who know they are driving too fast but actually don't particularly care? Whether "buffer zones" which give motorists time to move from 70 to 40 to 30 mph do have an effect. Sometimes it is simply about moving the speed limit sign a bit further out so that people have a chance to slow down before it is too late. This is a good example where the signs are too close to the houses, which are just round the curve, hidden in the shadows.

You certainly come away with an encyclopaedic knowledge of traffic problems across the county by the end of it. We were well supported by the expertise of the highways officers. Results of the process are due in February. Good luck to all who bid.

Hunts Road at Duxford - a spring dressing

Hunts Road gets a fair old pounding as it is the main route through Duxford and on to Ickleton, with lorries as well as cars using it. Despite the traffic calming features, because it is nice and straight people tend to go for it along there too.
Added to this the road is also quite narrow which means that wide vehicles tend to take a few centimetres off the sides, so that the road surface gets eaten into from the sides as the foundations are exposed.
The County Council highways team have been out filling in the worst of the potholes, and will do some more, and then in the spring the whole surface will be dressed.

Ickleton 20mph zone

The police are helpfully saying that they will be very willing to come and talk the parish council through what is needed by way of a speed survey so that the long-running attempt to get a 20mph zone on Abbey Street and Frogge Street can move on apace.

Ickleton and Babraham - roads as rat-runs, roads unmaintained, roads you can't get onto...

In the beautiful villages of Ickleton and Babraham this afternoon, where the consistent issue was the speed and press of traffic using narrow village streets as rat-runs, either to get to Sawston industrial area in the case of Babaraham or to shave some time off an M11/A11 journey by jinxing through Ickleton via Frogge Street.

The road surfaces themselves are not brilliant, and Babraham has real issues with the busy roads surrounding it that make it difficult to get onto or turn off from, especially the A1307, but the main point was the speed of the cars and vans trying to get through these villages, oblivious to polite speed signs. More robust traffic calming and re-routing of HGVs seems to be what is needed.
 

A sharp curve into Ickleton

This is the curve of the road into Ickleton from Duxford. Ten metres further on from where I was parked is the beginning of Abbey Street, a narrow road made narrower by parked cars.

I was there this afternoon on a blustery cold day talking to people in Abbey Street itself - who were asking how to slow cars down as they take this corner in particular, and not to go barrelling down past the pub - which was doing good business - and do a handbrake turn into Frogge Street. So traffic calming is one to think about here.
Even though there was a cricket match taking place by the village hall, it certainly did  NOT feel like late April.

Thriplow - making space for residents parking

A good discussion in Thriplow this evening with people in Sheralds Croft Lane.The houses were built well before the two car family was invented.So we scooted round and found some land that is no good to man nor beast and could take some of the pressure.

Baffler sound barrier for the scrapyard at Whittlesford

The parish council at Whittlesford voted in favour of the planning application from the scrapyard to put up a noise reducing sound barrier.
We want to understand more about the technical build and we want the environment officers to monitor this, from the district council, but this is a good step forward to reduce the noise from the business.
We also have the road swept now by the district - and trying to get the County to do something about the mud on the road.
 I have written to the police asking them to keep up their patrols in Station Road and we will also write to the transport commissioners about unsheeted loads leaving the yard.
 

Mea culpa, Little Abington!

It was pointed out to me this afternoon by an eagle-eyed reader in Abington that I wrongly assigned the Bourn Bridge Road junction to Great Abington, rather than recognise its rightful place within the bounds of Little Abington.
Its still a busy junction, and you need to be doubly eagle-eyed when pulling out!

Latest on noise issue re Welch's Transport application for the A505 site

The Environmental Health officers at South Cambs have sent me the following assessment about traffic noise and their plans to abate it regarding the planning application for the site on the south side of the A505 at Whittlesford Bridge:  

...it is paramount that detailed and precisely worded noise attenuation / mitigation conditions are imposed to ensure that any operational noise is mitigated and reduced to a minimum, to avoid significant adverse impact on the health and quality of life of existing residential premises arising as a result of the proposed new development.
 They also note:

...the conditions recommended for noise  are some of the most restrictive imposed on such a planning use, but as you know there is some activity during the night time period

Narrow sidewalk

Looking at the very narrow pavement running along north road into the village where people are forced to take to walking in the road. But when you look closely the footpath goes into the side of the bank for another two feet.

It would be safer if we can hack back a bit to give people a bit more room especially as traffic tends to come quite fast there.

Accident j/o of Station Road and Duxford Road

Monday evening - I was cycling back from the station at eight fifteen in the evening - saw a traffic accident at the junction of Station Road and Duxford Road involving two cars. A car emerging from Station Road had come straight out as the driver hadn't appreciated that they were approaching a crossroads.

The hedge alongside Duxford Road does protrude out so seeing if that can be cut back might help generally, but it seems in this case the accident was not caused by anything other than driver error.

Now the nights are getting longer we do need to be careful tho, especially given the numbers of people who cycle along Duxford Road where the streetlighting is minimal - including me!  

Welch's transport planning bid

Breaking news is that Duxford Parish have voted to oppose the planning application to build a transport site to the south of the A505 at Whittlesford Bridge. Whittlesford Parish took same view a few weeks back.

oops I did it again! Well, somebody did

Here's the latest state of the crash barrier j/o Whippletree and Newton Roads in Whittlesford where another driver has missed the curve. It had only just been fixed. Another task for the highways people. County cllr Tim Stone is on the case.

Yellow lines at last!

Well done to Cambs county council highways who did what they said they would when we met them in March and have now put double yellow lines round the corners of roads off station road in Whittlesford.
We hope it will make things safer for people pulling out onto the road if they haven't got parked cars to negotiate .
Next step is to stop cars parking further down these roads, but this is a start.

How can we slow things down along Newton Road?

Given that Newton Road is quite narrow, has some sharp bends and there are cars parked on the road, you'd think traffic passing through wouldn't just floor it. But they do - and the bent and dented metal rails at the corner of Middlemoor are proof.
Residents point out that the narrow pavement nearby at Bar Lane makes it tricky if you want to take children into the village itself, either to the shop or the school.
Each house has stickers on the bins making the "slow down" plea to traffic on refuse collection days. Maybe we have to think about some other methods - traffic calming and electronic hazard "kill your speed" lights for example.

Station Road - honey bees and holes in the road

Out in Royston Road and Station Road this evening - issues included the commuter cars parking from six in the morning, through the damage left from the lorries building the new developments (I'll see if the planning people can get the builders to come back and make good) to the noise from the scrapyard (where the parish council is arranging for residents to meet the owner to see if some compromises can be reached.
Also learned about the fate of English bees from the apiarist who sells very fine jars of their honey from the front-gate near the top of Station Road, and I was reminded that we still need BT to come and fix their telephone box after it was vandalised over a year ago!

Bollards!

Down in Heathfield this evening - beautiful blue sky and clouds sunset. The playarea and fields at the back of Kingsway looked stunning. So a good time to talk to people about keeping the developers away who want to encircle the area with more houses.

Differing views about the bollards that the Residents Assn. have put up to prevent parking on green areas. Most people were in favour, but some not so sure, pointing out that it meant if there was a family occasion or party then people now had to park up and down the street, which wasn't ideal.

recycling = and a strong road safety message

A very clear message on the district's bins in Newton Road in Whittlesford - this is a bit of a rat-run for drivers trying to get to the A505 and they come hell for leather down this narrow road. Fred Winter and others have complained about it.
So the bins serve a dual purpose - South Cambs recycling rates are very high - and they just might make the drivers think a bit too.

Thriplow Parish Council AGM

The Green Man at Thriplow

Over to Thriplow on Thursday for the PC annual meeting, where outgoing parish councillor Tim Spicer was given an engraved glass for his 16 years on the parish council.
The recreation ground play area has now gathered all the funding it needs - including £18,000 from the District Council - which I was happy to support. So now the improvement work begins, ready for the summer and the Jubilee.
Other issues including dog mess, the development proposals triggered by the call for land, whether there should be a parish plan, the yellow lines outside the village school, updates on local issues such as policing, village school, Heathfield issues etc etc 

Meeting finished, over to the Green Man for a very good pint and a natter.