Agenda item - Deputations from members of the public.

A list of deputations received by the due date of the 2 October, 2008 will be circulated at the meeting.

19.1         The Mayor reported that one Deputation had been received, which concerned the increased level of traffic on Highdown Road, and invited Mr. W. Shaw, as the spokesperson, to come forward and address the council.

19.2         Mr. Shaw thanked the Mayor and stated that:

            “We have a problem in our street with traffic and I am sure you hear this a million times.  Ours has become very much more acute in recent times and there are two reasons for this, one of which is there is an extraordinary demographic there.  We are right in the middle of six great Brighton schools, we have Stanford Infant, Stanford Junior, Davigdor, Somerhill, BHASVIC, Cardinal Newman, if you look at a map we are straight in the middle of these.

            In the last ten years the demographic has become extreme, you know there is an amazing amount of children living in that area.  I reckon there is something like 70% of flats and houses that now have children under 18 living in them, which is extraordinarily high.

            You have the ability to confirm these figures by going to the Education Department; they will be able to confirm how extraordinary it is.  If you want to, come down at Halloween and you will see hundreds of children out in that street at night.  It is quite remarkable. 

            This adds to another problem, we are a very wide, very long, very straight road coming off of Dyke Road and a brilliant thing has happened, we have traffic lights at the end of BHASVIC College because the students are all 16 year olds who would walk straight in front of a lorry unless those lights are there.  It is really good but if you are coming along Dyke Road and you wish to turn into Old Shoreham Road and you see the traffic backed up, around rush hour, you zoom down our street at 40mph to try and cut through.  This was not happening a year ago.  It has really increased as a real problem now and that is exactly the time these kids are coming back from school.  It is a very pressing problem and I would be very grateful if you could set a date when you can consider this problem as quickly as possible.

            I would be very grateful if you could take this seriously because something very bad is going to happen and a lot of the people who came along earlier on have seen things that would make your heart leap if you saw it.  There have been very close near misses this year and we do not want to see any of those actually having the same situation as that terrible thing in Portslade.”

19.3    Councillor Theobald stated that “I do take this very seriously indeed as I do all of these.  I do find that wherever I seem to go somebody somewhere calls me over such an issue and recently at the cricket ground a very good friend of mine tackled me on this very subject, so already a resident of Highdown Road has spoken to me about this and has mentioned this to me.

            I do understand and I had asked officers to check the casualty data for Highdown Road, which includes information both before and after the completion of the crossing in June, which you mention, and I was very pleased we were able to undertake that last year.  This investigation has shown that there is currently no change in that data. 

            Council officers have also, and I asked them to do this, covertly measured traffic speeds in Highdown Road this week during the afternoon peak hour.  The average speed recorded was 26mph with the highest recorded speed being 31mph.  Unfortunately, from your point of view, this confirms there is no reason to take immediate action.  However, I will and I have asked officers to continue to monitor the situation because, as you say, this is a situation which has got worse since the pedestrian crossing went in so it will be continuously monitored because this Administration takes very, very seriously safety measures, particularly where children are involved so please rest assured that we will continue to monitor this situation.”

19.4    The Mayor thanked Mr. Shaw for attending the meeting and speaking on behalf of the Deputation.  He explained that the points made had been noted and along with the petition presented by Councillor Davis, would now be referred to the Environment Cabinet Member Meeting.  The persons forming the Deputation would be invited to attend the meeting and would be informed subsequently of any action taken or proposed in relation to the matters set out by the Deputation.