AS SOMEONE who lives near a school (Stanford Road) and has observed the trouble-free arrival of children there year in, year out, I find myself utterly bemused by the implementation of the council’s proposed school streets scheme as presented in The Argus on Tuesday, February 23.

There is the fascinating article (Councillors "unaware" of the decision to close junctions) on page 9 and then Katy Rodda’s "mystified" letter on page 11 about the situation at St Luke’s in Queen's Park Rise.

Poor Katy understandably assumes that because the Experimental Traffic Order is labelled a "consultation process", then consultation must have taken place.

Well, it doesn’t seem to have, judging by the angry letters of the residents and the puzzled response of many councillors, all topped off by the admission of the council spokesman that "the legal wording of the order could have been clearer".

Another detail of the Queen's Park Rise situation that caused me concern was that Katy states the playground is closed before school and refers to a properly organised (and, I assume, insured) play day in the street last autumn. Presumably she and the council intend this to be the norm every day.

Apart from the fact that we are in the middle of a pandemic now, and such mixing seems ill-advised, in the long term who is liable if there is an accident of a non-traffic variety? Children are endlessly imaginative in finding ways of injuring themselves and one another.

I have been a teacher for most of my working life and am now a grandmother with school-age grandchildren and I find the situation as described incredible.

In my experience, school gates were always open well before school time. There would be members of staff there as well as a caretaker.

The same was true after school. Surely this must be the case at St Luke’s too? What on earth is going on? Stanford Road seems to manage OK on a much busier street.

I voted for Green councillors in the last elections so I wasn’t too heartbroken when the ruling Labour group stood down but I will think twice before doing so again if they cannot keep their voters properly informed about schemes which are causing inconvenience and costing public money.

Deirdre Counihan

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