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| The County Bridge in Brigg with No Entry painted on the road, plus two red and white warning signs to alert drivers. |
Most of us believe that, for the past 20-or-so years, it has been an offence to drive a vehicle into the area of the town centre...clearly marked - at all entry points - as being pedestrian only.
That being so, why was it necessary for the local authority to go to the trouble of making the North Lincolnshire Council (Bridge Street, Brigg) (Temporary Prohibition of Traffic) Order 2013?
This Order temporarily prohibits any vehicle from proceeding along that length of Bridge Street, Brigg, at the point of the Bridge over the River Ancholme.
Note inclusion of the word "temporarily."
To make matters even stranger, for a long time we've had huge white letters on the road in this very spot, proclaiming "No Entry" - and flanked by regulation road signs to warn approaching drivers they are nearing a pedestrian zone (see picture above).
This Order related to the replacement of a water main on the side of the County Bridge by the Environment Agency, not the council. Work is due to start on January 13 and take about three weeks.
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| A gleaning from a lamp-post at the corner of the street... Note the inclusion of the phrase "temporarily prohibit any vehicle." |
Methinks that in the past things were done on pretense.....adding 'NO ENTRY' signs implied that the road/bridge was closed to vehicular traffic.....but perhaps the bridge/road - the old A18 - was never officially declassified/downgraded. If it were, were are the public notices and the Ministry of Transport's agreement?? If they exists, it shouldn't be too difficult to ascertain such status of the bridge and the old A18 route along Bridge St.
ReplyDeleteIt must be remembered that the new road bridge and Barnard Ave were created officially as an access to the industrial site of Atherton Way via EU funding.......Did Humberside, as it was then, actually upgrade the Barnard Ave route to be the officially recognised diversion of the A18....with the assumption that the old route, including Brigg's pedestrian, could be, on pretense - ie without any official or legal binding, be downgraded as a vehicle-free zone?
If so, this could explain the enduring dilemma of the unresolved traffic problems in and about the Market Place and over the bridge.
And why 'temporary'? Surely, there would not be a need to included 'temporary', if past official documentation existed which declassified the route.....which brings me back full-circle that, methinks, when Barnard Ave was constructed, there was an spurious assumption of sorts that Bridge St - Wrawby St - Market Place - were no longer part of the A18's thoroughfare and could be pedestrianised.
How exactly does North Linc's legal section perceive the situation?
ReplyDeletePerhaps they could reveal the legal documents relating to what happened to the status of Bridge St (old A18)when Humberside received EU funding for the construction of an access road to Atherton Way.....The EU funding was not given to sponsor a new route for the A18...or even offer Brigg a relief road...