Steer clear please

Residents say their homes are being damaged by heavy traffic as drivers try to avoid a busy roundabout.

The campaign group, Traffic Reduction In Ollerton, has surveyed traffic in Ollerton village over hundreds of hours.

It says motorists use Main Street and Station Road to avoid the roundabout where the A616, A614 and the A6075 converge.

Members say a larger roundabout would not reduce congestion and traffic would still cut through the village.

They have appealed to drivers to allow more time for their journeys in case they are delayed at the roundabout.

Then, residents say, their lives would not be blighted by heavy traffic right outside their homes.

According to group surveys, more than 3,100 vehicles can go through the village over a 12-hour period.

The group says 70% of traffic that should use the roundabout goes through the village instead.

Mrs Ann Beaumont (58) has lived on Station Road for 26 years. Part of her home nearest the road is a 17th Century cottage.

But she said she no longer used those rooms because of the noise and her fear that vehicles could crash into her home.

She said she believed a large crack in her kitchen ceiling was the result of vibrations caused by heavy vehicles passing.

“We have to put up with drivers shouting at each other, using their horns, and sometimes almost coming to blows,” she said.

“The A614 was built as a bypass in the 1920s, but it seems we have become the bypass for the bypass.

“It is unacceptable that we should have to live with this fear and misery because little is being conserved in this conservation area.”

The group chairman, Mr Brian Smith, of Station Road, said drains were collapsing, road humps were being flattened under the weight of heavy vehicles, and 17th Century homes built on sandstone were being moved by vibrations from traffic.

The group has met the Nottinghamshire county councillor for Ollerton, Mrs Stella Smedley, who is also the council cabinet member for environment, and the highways manager for the Newark area, Mr Chris Charnley.

Mr Smith said, according to the group surveys, a new roundabout would be unable to cope with current traffic levels and drivers would still cut through.

“We feel like we are small beer and do not matter, and anything we say or do will make no difference,” he said.

Mrs Smedley told Ollerton and Boughton Town Council that council officers strongly favoured a non-traffic light scheme, which would be around £3/4m cheaper.

Mrs Smedley said research showed there were more accidents at roundabouts with lights than at those without.

She said traffic lights would require the compulsory purchase of more land than the non-light scheme and that could lead to a public inquiry, delaying the scheme for years.

The county council’s service director for planning and sustainability, Mr Steve Calvert, said: “This is not a crystal clear situation, but we hope to make the right judgment.

“We will go back to residents when we are ready to publish our preferred option, but we have not yet concluded anything.”