50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

What do you think about the quality and pace of housing development in Ware?
Alec
Posts: 180
Joined: Fri 07 Nov 2003 12:00 am
Location: Ware

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by Alec »

garymanchee wrote:Park Road has an Asda superstore, 2 huge GSK sites, 2 nurseries, 1 junior and a large senior school on a short stretch of single carriage way in a market town.
Can't remember if the Asda will open to Park Road or Watton Road? But, as for the rest, it's actually a pretty good sign of a vibrant town. If that lot wasn't there, we'd be living in a dead town!
garymanchee wrote:Park road is already a heavily congested and dangerous road which is used by over 1000 school students, GSK employees, pedestrians and visitors every day.
I'm always pretty impressed at how safe the road feels, given the amount of potential school/GSK/residential traffic. Yes, congested at school times - but show me any school that doesn't have the same! (What's it like around Presdales?)
garymanchee wrote:Park Road has a pitiful lack of off-road parking to accommodate its daily over-subscribed traffic volume.
Er: Lots of off-road parking for the schools - enough for pretty much any time other than open evenings where it does spill out onto the street. GSK has its own off-road parking for all staff. Residents - less so, but there's the parking bays at the entrance end, and a reasonable amount along the residential stretches, not to mention that quite a few houses also have drives. Again, much better than many roads with similar occupants.
garymanchee wrote:Park road is dangerous and presents a serious health and safety risk to pedestrians, cyclists and drivers alike. The road is often narrowed down to the width of a single vehicle especially during the school run. Emergency services vehicles have restricted access at certain times of the day in Park Road. Accidents have already occurred and the next could be serious.
Any more dangerous than other roads? I suspect any records might not indicate that. Sounds like the school run is your main beef. Again, show me any school that doesn't have twice daily traffic carnage.

All that said, I'm sad to see the loss of green space...
mb1
Posts: 509
Joined: Mon 15 Oct 2007 12:00 am
Location: Ware

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by mb1 »

ASDA will be accessed from the Watton Road, not Park Rd for the public. Delivery vehicles will use park road. The total of 50 dwellings includes houses and flats, include sheltered flats for the elderly. the car traffic from that won't be a lot, and in any case, except in morning and evening rush hour, Park Road is empty. Additional safety measures around crossings and he schools are already being considered and will be in place long before any new buildings are put up, and even if they never were, because they're needed. A few houses and flats isn't going make Glaxo go away, so what's your point about the 'industrial park'? Seems like you have a problem with the school run, which is worse at Kingshill and no better anywhere. I personally would rather see small pockets of development in the town than the destruction of the countryside around it.
garymanchee
Posts: 11
Joined: Mon 03 Nov 2014 5:15 pm

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by garymanchee »

so basically what I am saying is that Chauncy could have got the money from elsewhere in order to build a school sports hall. The development access to Park road is being sited directly between and literally yards from the GSK site entrance and GSK car park entrance on a fairly blind bend leading in from trapstyle road. And yes the school run exacerbates the problem but I don't think increasing the access to a busy part of the road with existing junctions close by is the answer.

Basically its about the Chauncy getting the money and all the other literature in the brochure (have you seen it or read it?) about "community", "partnership" , "connecting with residents" and "having no impact on existing roads" is bullshit.
pipcov
Posts: 1
Joined: Fri 07 Nov 2014 12:45 pm

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by pipcov »

50 houses plus possibly another ( at least)50 plus cars.
Add in all the extra vehicles bringing their kids to school (is it 8 extra classrooms>
And you will have the mother of all traffic jams early morning
And late afternoons.
Who dreamt this stupid scheme up.
Phil Coverdale
Dazzzzer
Posts: 16
Joined: Sat 27 Sep 2014 8:59 am

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by Dazzzzer »

garymanchee wrote:so basically what I am saying is that Chauncy could have got the money from elsewhere in order to build a school sports hall. The development access to Park road is being sited directly between and literally yards from the GSK site entrance and GSK car park entrance on a fairly blind bend leading in from trapstyle road. And yes the school run exacerbates the problem but I don't think increasing the access to a busy part of the road with existing junctions close by is the answer.

Basically its about the Chauncy getting the money and all the other literature in the brochure (have you seen it or read it?) about "community", "partnership" , "connecting with residents" and "having no impact on existing roads" is bullshit.
Well put Gary, these forums are always an interesting read !

As with most things in life most people don't tend to worry about things in general until it has a direct impact on them !

"Chauncy Community Partnership" the community were not consulted ! In fact for the 15 people who were invited to a presentation on the 29th September (invite through the door 2 days in advance) about the development, the Head informed attendees that the development was going ahead regardless of public opinion and pupils had already been informed of a new sports hall. Not much of a community partnership ! As a result, those attending have raised awareness and concerns.

There is now another meeting on the 12th November. The children delivering the invites said they were covering the whole area this time, pity this was not done early rather than the rather covert operation to date !

The School only need £2m for the hall, I am sure there are many other options that could have been considered if the community partnership actually involved the community. Maybe GSK would pay £2m for additional parking for their staff and visitors to assist the school and local community. Maybe they could also by the pool and gym !

Instead maximising financial gain for the School and developers etc appears to be the priority, not the local community or road safety etc.

Hopefully a more suitable scheme can be provided to keep everyone happy :)





,
mb1
Posts: 509
Joined: Mon 15 Oct 2007 12:00 am
Location: Ware

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by mb1 »

The school is holding a whole series of consultation meetings before the plans are even submitted. How is this not involving people? Why would Glaxo give £2m for a sportshall?? They won;t even sponsor the bloody fireworks anymore.
mb1
Posts: 509
Joined: Mon 15 Oct 2007 12:00 am
Location: Ware

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by mb1 »

The best way to stop traffic jams would be for the many parents who drive from trapstyle road to Chauncy and St Caths to stop doing so.
Dazzzzer
Posts: 16
Joined: Sat 27 Sep 2014 8:59 am

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by Dazzzzer »

mb1 wrote:The school is holding a whole series of consultation meetings before the plans are even submitted. How is this not involving people? Why would Glaxo give £2m for a sportshall?? They won;t even sponsor the bloody fireworks anymore.
Why not if it is in their interest and good investment etc, have they been asked ? Its a bit different to sponsoring a fireworks display !
Alec
Posts: 180
Joined: Fri 07 Nov 2003 12:00 am
Location: Ware

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by Alec »

Here's the publicity blurb for the proposed scheme: http://chauncyschool.com/chauncy-community-partnership/

Now I've actually found it, it's a relatively small addition to the main residential end of Park Road. Definitely rather more attractive as a place to live than the flats at the end of Trapstyle Road. And looks like they won't significantly detract from any of the other local residents in The Brickfields. The access to Park Road isn't that bad - much better than getting out of Wengeo Lane which really is a blind exit. Extra cars? A drop in the ocean!

But it is green land that we will lose. And schools shouldn't have to resort to this to fund new facilities. But I suspect other avenues will have been well explored.
Dazzzzer wrote:The School only need £2m for the hall, I am sure there are many other options that could have been considered if the community partnership actually involved the community. Maybe GSK would pay £2m for additional parking for their staff and visitors to assist the school and local community. Maybe they could also by the pool and gym !,
Why would GSK pay £2m? Didn't they already pay for pretty much all parking that the schools currently have, along with the off-street parking at the roundabout end back in the 90s when money was more freely flowing? I seem to remember that congestion in Park Road was *much* worse before then. Who can remember the nightmare of football nights before GSK paid to upgrade and relocate the football club to Wodson Park? So maybe we're not doing badly if a busy road is better now than it was 20 years ago...
mb1 wrote:The best way to stop traffic jams would be for the many parents who drive from trapstyle road to Chauncy and St Caths to stop doing so.
Well, of course! But there'll be flying pigs first!
The Masked Woler
Posts: 344
Joined: Wed 08 Jan 2014 11:52 am

Re: 50 more houses, is Park Road not busy enough ?

Post by The Masked Woler »

garymanchee wrote:let them build 200 flats near your house then :D ?
I would love it, rather than the thousands they are planning on/already building.

As a matter of interest how many of those who object to this one filed their objections to the District Plan?
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