Action pledge on junction logjam Burger chain road bid sparks wider debate on traffic
A Stirling councillor is vowing to pursue improvements to a problematic city road junction near a McDonald’s restaurant and drivethrough.
Proposed changes to the burger chain’s site at Raploch sparked a wider debate about the Back O’Hill Road junction during a meeting of Stirling Council’s planning panel recently.
Several members echoed the concerns of SNP councillor Jim Thomson over the regular logjams at the busy crossroads, which features a turn-off leading to both McDonald’s and the Sainsbury’s superstore and filling station.
The panel unanimously approved an application by McDonald’s for a minor reconfiguration of their drive through lane and car park to allow ‘side by side’ ordering in a double lane.
However, members also questioned the impact of the changes on surrounding traffic routes, despite roads officials saying they should make no difference.
While there had been no objections to the application, Councillor Thomson had asked the panel to consider the application over traffic concerns.
He said: “I’m not against what they are doing but I think they have missed a trick here.
“If you get a car entering to turn right they sometimes can’t because of the queue. That then makes the traffic behind back up to the junction.
“They should revert back to what they did during Covid. Vehicles went down to the roundabout and came round. While there was no objection to the application proposal something needs to be done to improve that junction.”
Panel members were told, however, that they could only deal with the application before them and that the reconfiguration was to a “fairly standard operating model” for McDonald’s.
Council planner Iain Jeffrey said: “I did take forward Councillor Thomson’s concerns to roads officers and they felt there wasn’t any increase in trips generated from this development ...so couldn’t really impose anything in terms of conditions [for the junction].
“The whole point behind this reconfiguration is to process customers through the drive through facility more quickly and reduce the time for their orders to be given so by the time they are at the windows it’s ready.
There would be faster processing of customers and the knock-on effect would be lesser impact on queueing.
“That retail park area is a private road so there’s a question mark over the council’s ability to impose planning conditions that would require no right hand turning.”
Labour councillor Danny Gibson said he was unsure if the junction at the public road would be sustainable for much longer and that residential roads in Raploch shouldn’t be used as a ‘rat-run’ as a result.
However, roads officials said while the order process at McDonald’s would “double up”, exiting the restaurant’s site shouldn’t change and it was still one line for payment and pick-up.
Tory councillor Alistair Berrill, however, was unconvinced saying: “It seems to be more than arguable that if you can process your customers through twice as quickly you are thereby increasing your notional capacity.”
Councillor Gibson said while convenience for existing customers would be a consideration for McDonald’s, he struggled to accept that there wasn’t some business rationale to the change.
“But the application is as it is,” he said, “and there will be impacts we will need to keep a close eye on. We are probably going to have to have a conversation with businesses in this area. Sainsbury’s is there as well.”
Councillor Thomson said: “I will be taking this forward. We can’t do anything today but I’m pleased [the junction issue] is being highlighted.”