A NEED for speed reduction without loss of parking spaces has driven Okehampton residents to reject a Devon County road scheme.
More than 50 Neighbourhood Watch members voiced unanimous approval of a 20mph limit for North Street and Crediton Road ? but rejected the associated introduction of parking alterations.
A meeting, chaired by Neighbourhood Watch coordinator for Northfield Road, Crediton Road and North Street, Ken Munt, said the impasse was that there was no solution to slow vehicles that residents found acceptable.
?Parking on Northfield Road and Crediton Road is on one side only. The proposed scheme was to break up the straight run through by putting down a chicane of parking,? said Mr Munt, adding that residents felt this would merely create a slalom for motorists.
?We have elderly people and children walking up here. I doubt from the drawings that the council supplied to us that emergency vehicles would get through very quickly.?
Mr Munt said it was felt that before the speed problem was solved the parking problem had to be resolved.
?Anything they do in the street ? even if it is speed bumps ? will reduce parking. The roads and streets were built in 1900 and the traffic is 2003 which does bring its own inherent problems.?
Mr Munt said there was considerable space behind Northfield Road and Crediton Road which could possibly be utilised ? even for a temporary period ? for parking.
?Whatever is done will always be a compromise. What we?d like to see is everyone with a parking space. But what we don?t want is where you have to walk a quarter or half-a-mile with anyone?s guess who will be able to park by their house.?
Mr Munt said if the on-road and off-road parking in the town is not addressed things could only get worse.
Parking alterations could lose at least 15 on-road spaces which the meeting said was totally unacceptable.
The meeting asked the county council to go back to the drawing board to see if they cannot come up with a better solution.
Okehampton mayor and Devon County Councillor Christine Marsh, who attended the meeting, was asked to look into the parking problems of Northfield and Crediton Road specifically and the town in general.