A lady named Diana Pidwell has attracted the attention of the local newpaper today with a serious complaint about the safety of a new pedestrian crossing in South Shore. Perversely I did sport a grin when I read this story but you will see why shortly.
In their infinite wisdom, plonkers in the council planning department have decided to site a crossing on the very top of Station Bridge on Lytham Road. It’s unsure whether their planning process entailed getting a map out and blindly stuck a drawing pin in a potential location, but in the crossing’s current state it is a serious hazard to life.
In case you’re still wondering why this could be, try driving along there one day. With it being on the brow of the bridge, the angle of elevation dictates that as a motorist you can not see the crossing at all until you’re almost on top of it.
There are signs at the side of the road telling pedestrians that the crossing is not in use, but as Mrs Pidwell says they tend to get blown over and in any case pedestrians tend to ignore them – after all, we’re taught from school that a zebra crossing is a safe place to cross a road, and this is after all a zebra crossing.
When people are simply stood by the roadside looking for a safe time to cross, the pedestrians are not expecting the traffic to stop and indeed traffic must not stop for them because this creates danger for other motorists.
But the Highway Code says that motorists must stop when approaching a pedestrian crossing if there are people waiting. Pedestrians therefore can, and do assume that the traffic will stop in this case because it’s a crossing.
And therein lies the problem with this crossing. It appears to be open road from a motorist’s point of view (until the last minute) and they see no reason to slow down from 30mph, yet from a pedestrian’s point of view they assume that because it’s a crossing, the traffic will slow down and stop. Needless to say, this apparently has resulted in some near misses and screeching tyres with motorists being surprised when a pedestrian suddenly walks out in to the road.
Some brainbox from the council says that ‘monitoring’ has shown them that people going from the car park to the promenade always cross at the top of the bridge. I dread to think how much of our money was wasted monitoring that, given that anyone with even a fraction of a braincell would cross there too because it’s the only place you can see both ways.
Enter the man responsible for paying for it: our favourite bearded scaffolder Cllr Ian Fowler.
This bumbling buffoon has bundled into the story and put up a quite absurd defence of this stupid crossing. He says he doesn’t believe it’s an accident waiting to happen, and that people should abide by the rules of the road, the implication being that only speeding motorists would fail to see this crossing. Fowler was obviously speeding when he went over there because he clearly hasn’t seen it. If you are not aware of this crossing, you wont see it until your car is on top of it. It’s as simple as that.
The Boxer Scaffolding boss went on to say that the crossing had been placed there because schoolchildren cross there, as do people going to the doctors. Bleat bleat bleat. Alright you’ve proven that you’ve never been down there now Ian, because there’s a crossing much closer to the doctors than this one. Oh and there’s a crossing much closer to the school as well. So stop picking on the weakest of society for sympathy votes and admit this crossing is a mistake.
It's on top of this bridge: would you be able to see it?
Fowler continued and said he hopes the crossing will slow traffic down and, “stop drivers thinking they can just barrel their way through to the shops on Highfield Road”. I’m not sure that your method of allowing pedestrians to walk out like lemmings in front of unexpectant motorists is the best way of doing that. Placing a speed camera on the hill would have a better effect, just like it has when driving in the other direction.
Of course, they are not intending to leave the crossing like it is. In the next two weeks there will be beacons up at the side of the road but this is only because the paper is exposing the council’s contempt for the safety of Blackpool residents. That crossing has been left like that for a long time.
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Every time i drive over that fucking hill i have a heart attack, if a zebra crossing suddenly appears (just like when speed camera white lines appear) you shit yourself, or at least i did. Now when im going over it i make a very conciouse effort to see that there are no people waiting, of course this wasnt too easy back on the day of the BFC parade, as there was a traffic que down the side of the hill, including a bus. Making it very hard to see if anyone was waiting. I didnt speed over it that day because i happen to know now that there is a crossing there.. but what of the people who dont? I dread to think what could happen – and probably unfortunately will happen if the crossing is left there. Beacons will not make a difference, the top of the hill is not in a drivers field of vision until they are half way up the hill.
I understand that its the best place to cross (as opposed to the bottom of either side), but what fucking use is a zebra crossing that only the pedestrians know about? it makes no difference to if it wasnt there and people were just using common sense to look for traffic before they cross.
Nothing will be done, as usual.. until there is an accident.
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concious*
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conscious even – I remember it’s like conscience (con-science) though that adds nothing to the debate so sorry.
It is a supid place – though beacons and for locals knowing it’s there eventually will help. I remember one being placed in Bedford just after a very large roundabout (I was just driving through pre sat navs from Oxford to Cambridge). Well of course I was looking at direction signs at the roundabout which had overgrown high landscaping so you didn’t see the exit road well and then as soon as I’d turned off was on top of a zebra having almost got someone crossing (though they should have looked to see if everyone was slowing down). I’m sure these things are designed from head quarters by people who haven’t gone to the sites at all.
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There are numerous counts of planning insanity.
1 The bus stop outside the Half Way House meaning buses have to cross into the outer lane from a standing start.
2 The cylce tracks which are only advisable! That means that vehicles CAN legally park putting cyclists in danger. They subsequently ride on the pavements putting everyone on foot – do you remember them? They are called pedestrians – in danger.
Don’t ask Councillor Ian Fowler for comment. He only travels first class rail. I might just put my camera in my pocket and record the idiocies. Oh, done that and still get ignored.
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I totally agree that pedestrians seem to be an underclass in every policy they come out with (especially as regards cycling which has a powerful lobby behind it).
In particular (is is still common edge road?) past the airport where the pavement is split into two – large outer part for cyclists and pedestrians in a narrow lane which you can’t walk all the way along because of the bushes sticking out.
Some of the bus stops are ludicrous in where they’ve been sited – if you’re in Lytham coming along the front past the Land Registry and turn left at the lights you can end up having to stop for the bus at a stop which cars wouldn’t be allowed to park on for being too near a junction, unable to see if it’s safe to go around it.
Again though this is all because transport policy and highways planning is done behind a desk (for Lytham St Annes I know it’s done from Kendal) – if they do a site visit it isn’t necessarily representative of usual conditions.
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Fowler continued and said he hopes the crossing will slow traffic down and, “stop drivers thinking they can just barrel their way through to the shops on Highfield Road”.
Shops on Highfield Road? Are they building some?
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