A councillor has predicted that plans to remove the right turn out of Three Bridges Station will cause so many problems that they will have to be reversed later down the line.
Improvement work around the station was approved on March 7 and will see the forecourt remodelled, a new access for pedestrians and cyclists opened on Station Hill, and the lanes approaching the station under the railway bridge reduced from three to two to make room for a shared footpath/cycleway.
But the removal of the right turn has proved particularly contentious.
Richard Burrett chaired the planning committee which approved the plans, though he himself voted against them.
During a meeting of the full council on Wedesday (March 29), Mr Burrett shared concerns that more traffic would start taking short cuts through residential areas to avoid having to make the 1.5-mile round trip to the Squareabout and back just to be pointing in the right direction.
He added: “I believe there is going to be a time when we may have to sadly revisit this scheme because of the damage it’s caused.”
Mr Burrett said he supported the scheme on the whole as the front of the station was ‘in dire need’ of improvement.
But he felt the right-turn ‘stumbling block’ would have a ‘serious detrimental effect’ on the people of his ward.
His views were shared by Kevan McCarthy (Con, Pound Hill North & Forge Wood), who accused the council of ‘pushing ahead and ignoring the concerns of residents’.
As well as sharing concerns about the impact on neighbourhoods to the east of the town, Mr McCarthy predicted a financial impact for the taxi drivers who use the station rank.
He said potential customers would decide to walk ‘rather than pay for a scenic detour around the Squareabout’.
Others, though, were pleased to see the scheme – which has been more than a decade in the making – finally being accepted.
Tim Lunnon (Lab, Broadfield) predicted free-flowing traffic going under the railway bridge in both directions as it would not have to keep stopping to allow vehicles out of the station.
Both he and Peter Lamb (Lab, Northgate & West Green) reminded the meeting that the road layout – including the lack of a right turn – was the remit of West Sussex Highways, not the borough council.
Mr Lamb said the council had ‘asked them to review it repeatedly’ only for them to repeatedly come back with the same scheme.
He added:
“We’re finally going to deliver a scheme that actually will improve the town’s infrastructure.
“That’s a moment to take some pride in rather than obsessing over details that no one in this room has any control over.”
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