THE fight to scrap the controversial Whitchurch rural gateway is to continue — despite recent concessions from highways officials who have just completed modifications to the single-track stretch of road.

Cllr Roger Mathew, backed overwhelmingly earlier this year by West Devon Borough Council when he called for the county council to restore two-way traffic to the road, vowed to continue the fight this month.

Cllr Mathew now has a seat on West Devon's partnership committee, which instigated the gateway in response to residents' concerns about speeding traffic in Whitchurch Road.

He said: 'Restoration of two-way traffic is an option, it's what the borough agreed to call for and it's what my motion will call for at the next partnership meeting.'

And Cllr Mathew was 'not very happy' the modifications were carried out without agreement by the partnership committee and before the coming meeting.

But campaigners who fought for three years to get the gateway scrapped think the modifications are the best result they are likely to get from the county council.

Whitchurch resident Ian Kilpatrick, who sent and received hundreds of letters and e-mails in the gateway battle, said: 'I still would like it removed completely, but I think this is the best compromise we are going to get.

'It was a nightmare getting them to agree anything. I had a three-hour meeting up there, when I told them you couldn't see through it.

'I ended up crouching down at driver's level in the middle of the road and they finally admitted you can't see.'

Mr Kilpatrick was now going to 'rest the case' in his campaign, he said. 'There is now no excuse to speed, it is a 30mph area, or deliberately try to damage the sides, as the frustration factor has largely been removed,' he said.

And he paid tribute to fellow campaigner Bill Smyly and Cllr Roy Connelly.

'He has put in a tremendous amount of unsung, background work into this,' said Mr Kilpatrick.

Cllr Connelly said: 'I am very pleased with what has happened. There will be some who will still have a problem with it, but I think it will satisfy most people.

'We have to get the message out now that changes have taken place, the county has listened and hopefully people will have much more confidence in using it.

'Removing it was never an option, we had to say, "What's the best we can achieve?" — It's a triumph for people listening to each other.'

The modifications include removing the banks on the approaches to the gateway to improve visibility and increasing the length of the passing places.

Mike Parnell, the county's local services officer, said: 'There were concerns about lack of visibility; we've taken on board those concerns, discussed the options that could be done to make it better and tried to address them.'

Mr Parnell said the road will be redressed in the next week or so and clearly relined.

Cllr Gretta Madigan, partnership chairman at the time the gateway was introduced, said the idea had been to slow people down in a 'non-urban' way.

'I didn't feel humps and lots of traffic signs were the best way to do it. The original concept was to make it look like many of the other rural lanes we have around here,' said Cllr Madigan.

She said the gateway was working, in that it discouraged fast drivers from using Whitchurch Road.

The gateway formed part of a £26,000 package of traffic-calming measures, including an 'urban gateway' at the Tavistock end of Whitchurch Road, plus a 20mph speed limit by Whitchurch School.