It is unlikely that Suffolk County Council will act to resolve the traffic chaos that occurs twice a day in Folly Road. Other measures need to be considered to reduce the number of cars that drop off and pick up children every day.
Ever since I became a District Councillor almost four years ago one of the most intractable problems in the Ward has been the issue of traffic congestion at Great Waldingfield School.
Anyone who lives in Folly Road, or who drives along past the school in the mornings when children are arriving, or in the afternoon, when they are leaving, will know what I mean. There is no doubt that the situation is unsatisfactory and that the volume of traffic and pedestrians intermingling with one another presents a clear risk of injury or worse.
Responding to a request from the Governors of the School two years ago Colin Spence, our County and District Councillor, and I sought to have some action taken, but in the end, despite the fact that Babergh District Council was prepared to provide parking space on the playing field close to the school, no money was forthcoming from the County Council to facilitate any changes. The reasons given were that firstly funds were limited, and secondly it was not the policy of the County Council to encourage the use of cars to take children to school.
A further attempt to promote a traffic management scheme at the school was made during the consultation in respect of the reorganisation of the Education System throughout Suffolk. However at the public meeting when the matter was raised it was made clear by the officers that they preferred to spend scarce resources on education itself, rather than on parking spaces and other measures that would only be used for a limited period every day.
This is not a problem that is confined to Great Waldingfield. The position in Acton is little better, and anyone driving from Acton to Sudbury at the ‘wrong’ time of the day will know that a chaotic situation sometimes pertains at All Saints Middle School in Acton Lane. Drivers into Ipswich during the rush hour are often held up for several minutes by traffic outside Hintlesham Primary School. The truth is that this is at least a county-wide, and probably a nationwide problem.
So what is to be done?
I think that it has to be accepted that the County Council is unlikely to change its mind on this one, bearing in mind that the council’s financial position is markedly worse than it was even two years ago.
I have made some suggestions over the years that might serve to at least mitigate the problem, and one of them, that our local PCSO Siobhan should make regular appearances in Folly Road to encourage safe practices, has been taken up. However the school governors and the parents might consider other measures, which, while not solving the problem, might reduce the number of cars arriving at any one time.
