Carole’s October Blog

Dear All,
We had a lovely final ride for the year to Windsor Great Park to see the Acers. They were not quite as colourful as previous years but the ride was nice. You can see a picture of the happy cyclists on our web page. Thank you Sandra for leading it.

The subject of our Christmas dinner was brought up and we thought we would discuss it at our next virtual Pub night, this coming Tuesday 26 October at 7pm.
If you can’t attend perhaps you could send me your thoughts on the matter of a Christmas dinner at The Sovereigns by return email. Thank you.

I received an email today from the National Highway saying the  Secretary of State has decided to re-set the statutory deadline for decision on the M25 junction 10/A3 Wisley interchange improvement application to 12 May 2022 This is to allow for further consideration of environmental matters. For more information visit the  M25 junction 10 web page.

Meanwhile Norman has been working away trying to get the council to improve the lot for cyclists and pedestrians.I will copy his letters and reply below.

Happy cycling

Regards,
Carole Frost

Norman’s correspondences:

Hello Matt,

As you may know I am the chair of the Woking Cycle Users Group WCUG ,we have been working hard to 1/ get  cyclists and pedestrian routes standards back to where they need to be and 2/ Have pedestrian/cycle routes provided between Woking and all  surrounding communities…

Two examples which we as a cycle group-,me personally,Will Forster. and other correspondence to the local news papers have been sadly disregarded are 

[1] The condition of the roadway at the temporary pedestrian road crossing at the Victoria Arch at the junction with the HIgh St,A 320  and Goldsworth Road and the fact that” for many years the crossing Green period was only 4 seconds- not long enough for a disabled,pram pusher  to get across before the red light showed.This was dispite representation to SCC Enginers,WBC chief executive and the disabled representative in Woking.

I my great relief that time was extended to 7 seconds about 2 months ago.

[2] The pedestrian crossing in Old Woking across the high street has a sounder to alert the blind Residents who lives in Hassle Court and shops at the Bob Bon shop.The strip of tarmac is in a very rough state,not safe for a blind person to take advantage of the crossing with out a companion.Representations of Will Forster,local residents and the shop manager have had no attention,See my photograph showing my highlighting the situation on the day before SCCD engineers repaired orange market on the road outside of the crossing route.

These are examples of a, cycle/pedestrian routes in a shocking state of non repair,repaint,clear of rubbish,repair when the main part of the road is repaired.Pedestrian routes and cycle routes to damaged for cyclists and pedestrians to use them

The point I have tried to emphasise is that the group of road users who suffer the major deaths and injuries on the roads get virtually NO spending ,whilst the safe vehicle drivers have a vast amount,the focus needs to refocused in order to stop the unnecessary imbalance.

Kind Regards
Norman

He received the following reply:

 On 18 October 2021 at 09:15 Matthew Furniss <matt.furniss@surreycc.gov.uk> wrote: 

Dear Mr Johns,

Thank you for your email of 10 September and for highlighting the condition of the temporary pedestrian road crossing at the Victoria Arch and Goldsworth Road junction, and at the pedestrian crossing in Old Woking High Street. Please accept my sincere apologies for the delay in responding to you.

I have spoken to our Asset Management team about these crossings who have provided me the following information:

“The Victoria Road crossing is potentially affected by the Victoria Arch Scheme which is part of the major development in and around Woking. You may already be familiar with the widening scheme but if you would like to know more information, it can be found here Victoria Arch widening scheme: project background | Woking Borough Council.  Unfortunately we would not take action to resurface this section of road at this stage due to the likely impact of the widening scheme. However, in the meantime we will continue to inspect the area as part of our regime of safety inspections and will repair any defects that meet our intervention levels. More information on how we inspect our roads can be found here Highway Safety Inspections – standards and procedures – Surrey County Council (surreycc.gov.uk). It is always helpful when members of the public report issues they have identified and the quickest way to get them reviewed by an Inspector is to report them via our online website here Surrey County Council – Tell us about potholes or other issues with roads and cycle lanes (surreycc.gov.uk)

The crossing you refer to in Old Woking High Street is part of our future plans for resurfacing in the area. The map below is an extract from our interactive map on our website which shows the planned maintenance and improvement work for Highways. Unfortunately, this work is unlikely to take place this financial year due to other works that have taken priority, but we will continue to inspect the location for safety defects and any deterioration of the road surface. The scheme will stay on the programme and be considered for future years or budgets as they become available. Once a scheme has been prioritised for work it will be updated on this map. I have attached a link to the map on our website if you wish to monitor the scheme for prioritisation Horizon – highway maintenance investment programme – Surrey County Council (surreycc.gov.uk)

As stated above we have arranged for our Highway Safety Inspector to visit both locations and, if any safety defects are present, arrange for them to be repaired.  If there are no actual defects there that meet our intervention level, in accordance with our Safety Inspection Policy, we will consider whether we can carry out some patching work there (this is not resurfacing) but this will depend on the Victoria Arch Scheme, as above, how much of the road is in poor condition and what funds are available.

We take the safety of all road and pavement users into consideration when carrying out our highway safety inspections, repairs and surveys and thank you for bringing this matter to our attention.”

I appreciate this is not possibly not the response you were hoping for but I hope the above information is useful and thank you once again for contacting me.

Kind regards
Matt Furniss