Resident Jim Brown has written an interesting article about the volume of traffic through the village over the last twenty or so years.
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Resident Jim Brown has written an interesting article about the volume of traffic through the village over the last twenty or so years.
The traffic coming in from didcot has not slowed down at all they speed in up to the chicane on didcot rd speed watch are never there early morphs
I totally disagree with the speed watch Didcot way in speeding all the time !!!6am and again at the weekends it’s only slow when it’s gridlocked !!Blocking entrance to Saxons heath !!
Someone from the Community Speedwatch group will correct me if I’m wrong, but there are limitations on where and when they can conduct their sessions. They are restricted to only working in daylight hours for safety, and each spot they stand at has to be risk assessed also for their own safety. So they cannot just stand anywhere they like.
(Plus, they’re volunteers, and I expect they relish the thought of doing this at 6am as much as I would, especially as I know they get hassle and abuse from passing drivers. They deserve a thank you for even bothering to turn up at all).
Yes, traffic isn’t always doing the correct speed as they enter the village gateway from the South, it is expected for there to be a transition from high speed to low speed. (Can you honestly say you’re ALWAYS doing 20mph as you pass the gateway?) However, they are physically prevented from speeding past the first chicane.
The radar SID can ‘see’ traffic from a long way off and easily monitors the speed after they’ve crossed the chicane. So I can say with reasonable certainty that 97% of traffic IS staying below 25mph, which is far better than the 85% the Council hopes for. And this is constantly monitoring ALL traffic 24hrs a day. Even at 6am. It has nothing to do with the Speedwatch volunteers.
None of this is my opinion, it is simply the factual data we have. If you disagree with; A. The Volunteers’ hard work, and B. The official public data, then you’re more than welcome to help and do something about it.
I go to work full time !!
Many people have busy jobs, yet they find the time to volunteer around the community if they want to.
My point is you can continue to make negative comments about everything, or if something bothers you then you can try to help.
Simply complaining about something will never get it resolved – be a part of the solution.
Statistics can be used according to when taken . All I know is that at certain times in the day getting around in the village especially if you keep to the speed limit is definitely more difficult than when I moved here 24 years ago . Twice last week it took me 10 minutes to get out of my drive and although cannot gauge speeds with any accuracy the cars coming pass my entrance we’re going faster than 20 mph as in that time I counted 8 cars pass before I could exit thus was around 10.40 in the morning. I also think we get more traffic when hold ups or accidents on the A34
Taking the time to work all these statistics out deserves a thank you from the village as it does put things in perspective and interesting to know .
Of course, there will be busier days than others. These data are to show long term average trends spanning years. Whilst we can get daily data (to a certain degree) it’s not overly useful as it fluctuates so much from day to day.
However, I’ve checked the data from the SID at your end of the village and it tells a very similar story:
Up to 20mph: 80%
20 to 25mph: 18%
Over 25mph: 2%
Average speed: 18mph
Again, far better results than is targeted. With 98% of people doing 25mph or less the SIDs are doing their jobs well.
Whatever the correct volume of traffic here, a quick Google check shows that 5-6,000 vehicles a day is on a parallel with the number of vehicles passing through the Port of Dover daily…. so we are hardly a candidate for
a Green Lane.
Thank you Jim for taking the initiative & time for compiling the report, it makes interesting reading. It is hard to believe that the traffic through the village hasn’t increased over the years however facts are facts.
I think we certainly suffer when surrounding roads particularly the A34 are closed/blocked due to roadworks/accidents.
Thank you for the ‘shout out’ for the village Speedwatch team, we are a team of only 4,
2 retired, 2 working mums. We do the best we can, when we can. We would welcome new volunteers. Speedwatch does make our village safer.