More development and danger on the A308

The Royal Borough is conducting the next phase of its traffic survey about the A308 Windsor Road, closing at the end of this Sunday, January 24.

Despite the prolonged concerns of residents who live along or off Windsor Road, RBWM council keep approving a little more building and traffic every year or two along the A308, which over time has accumulated to result in a congested, polluted and often dangerous situation particularly during peak times.

There have been two separate deaths from road accidents along this section, and often many risky situations with vehicles turning into the flow of traffic, and yet the survey team are only considering accidents over the last five years.

There was NO proper consideration of these issues during planning approval for

the hospice, with its 200 car parking spaces, indicating the large number of daily traffic movements from and back onto the A308. At that planning meeting, Cllr Coppinger explained that he had visited the site before approval when it was still a field and had difficulty leaving out into the traffic.

It was also explained that traffic along the A308 amounts to 18,000 vehicles per day and how this was similar to a major road in Northern Ireland which was being made into a dual-carriageway .... and this was not possible for the A308. And yet the hospice was approved with no further consideration.

RBWM has had the funding set aside for this survey for the last two years, so one has to question why it is only now being carried out after prior consideration of the Hospice and other building.

Pollution around the Holyport Road roundabout exceeds permitted levels. After campaigning by the Council for Protection of Rural England, planning precedent has been set with the refusal on pollution grounds of a recent house-building application in Kent. That judgement refers to the Air Quality Directive which states ‘in order to protect human health and the environment health as a whole, it is particularly important to tackle emissions and pollutants at source and to identify and implement the most effective emission reduction measures at local, national and community level ...’.

There must be NO more development from Junction 14 (the beginnings of Braywick) to Junction 11 (the beginnings of Dedworth), adding more traffic and often long queues of pollutiing vehicles along Section 5 in both directions towards Maidenhead and the M4 (Junction 15) or towards Windsor and the Windsor relief road (Junction 9a/9b).

The Government, RBWM and many other authorities have declared climate action to achieve net zero by 2050 or preferably sooner to comply with the Paris Climate Accord. We need real action and decisions to achieve this. And COVID-19 has shown the need for a new normal to protect our own health and that of the planet.

We need residents please to respond by Sunday 24th January to the RBWM survey at consultprojectcentre.co.uk/a308phase2 and including the above points in their ‘any further comments’ box.

PAUL GROVES Tithe Barn Drive

Maidenhead