'Life transforming' pedestrian crossing on busy school route denied despite accident involving child

Parents have been told a busy road on a school route can’t have a “life transforming” crossing because there are other parts of Sheffield which are more dangerous.
Sheffield town hallSheffield town hall
Sheffield town hall

More than 450 people signed a petition calling for a pedestrian crossing on Psalter Lane near Osborne Road and Brincliffe Gardens.

Helen Brown presented it at a full council meeting and said: “A child was involved in an accident on this road earlier this year and thankfully, it wasn’t serious on that occasion but we feel that it is only a matter of time before a pedestrian sustains a more serious injury.

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“Psalter Lane is totally overwhelmed during rush hour. The funnelling effect on to it means pedestrians are forced to walk along the most unpleasant and polluted routes.

“Another crossing on Psalter Lane would mean pedestrians could avoid walking right next to the idling lines of traffic spewing out exhaust fumes at a child’s height.”

Ms Brown said three schools, several nurseries, a dance school, a pub and two new housing developments would all benefit from the crossing.

“The pavement on Psalter Lane has an extremely narrow section which means any stumble or mistake with a bike or scooter puts a child straight into the road where cars regularly travel at speed.

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“There are families who drive the 1.5 mile journey to school because they believe it to be too dangerous or stressful to walk.

“This shouldn’t be the case, travelling both actively and sustainably should not be an inconvenient misery, nor should it present a risk to life.

“The council should be prioritising active travel, and assist or reward those residents wanting to replace those shorter unnecessary car journeys for the benefit of all.

“The school run is an obvious obvious example of this type of journey. If we really want to encourage people off the road and to reduce carbon emissions. We need to make it safer, shorter and easier for pedestrians. A pedestrian crossing would be life transforming.”

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Coun Douglas Johnson, Executive member for transport, said it was important for people to report accidents or near misses because that data was used to assess which roads needed traffic calming.

He said: “Yes, there is a need for a crossing but no, we’re not going to provide one because there’s not enough money. There is money, but there are other roads that are even worse states.

It is a pretty unpleasant trip to go to Hunters Bar school for instance. It’s pretty bad at anytime day, it’s not a nice road to walk along and it’s certainly not a good one to cross.

“The sad thing is there are so many locations that are actually far worse, there’s a whole list of things right across the city, and of course they’re not spread evenly, there are far worse places in the more deprived areas.”

Coun Johnson said he would speak to Hunters Bar Infants school to see if there was scope for a walking bus.