Crossing call ruled out by committee

Safety: SNP puffin proposal dropped

Calls to instal a crossing near a new multi-millionpound academy have been ruled out.

Aberdeen’s opposition SNP group put forward a number of proposals yesterday aiming to boost the safety for pupils at the new Lochside Academy, including a £35,000 puffin crossing on Cove Road.

A motion was approved at the education committee asking for the operations committee, which ran just an hour later, to consider the proposals.

But sitting operations convener Ross Grant ruled out the new crossing, citing officer’s traffic modelling that it was not required.

He said the need would be reassessed after the near-£50 million school had been opened for a number of months and that a puffin crossing on Earns Heugh Road was to be installed.

This promoted an angry response from opposition councillors who said it showed the education committee was “toothless”.

SNP group leader Stephen Flynn, a councillor for Kincorth, Nigg and Cove, said: “What we are putting forward is the views of residents, parents have told us that Cove Road simply isn’t safe.”

Ward colleague Alex Nicoll warned that “time was running out” to bring in the measures with only three months until the school opens.

However Conservative councillor Alan Donnelly said that there were already three traffic islands on the road and said the SNP were “ignoring the evidence” which showed that few people crossed there.