Petition for Lancashire County Council (LCC) Highways to improve pedestrian safety along Eastway between Grasshoppers turning and Wychnor.

This stretch of pavement is heavily used on a daily basis by local residents, families (some with prams and/or small children) school children including those on bikes (usually in large groups from Broughton High School).

The stretch of road is excessively dangerous for these pedestrian with the volume of traffic including HGVs travelling at/above the current 40mph speed limit inches from pedestrians.

This is exacerbated by how narrow the pavements are (only wide enough for two shoulder-to-shoulder or even a single person in places!), and further impacted by the vegetation (on PNE owned land managed by Northern Trust) regularly overgrowing the pavement and seldom cut back, forcing pedestrians to walk even closer to or on the road.

When the pavement is busy, typically twice daily during school start/finish times, the dangers are increased with pedestrians passing each other while traffic speeds along at 40mph+ inches from the curb. As the population in the area grows with local housing developments this issue is only going to become more of a needless problem, and possibly a fatal one.  

LCC has released a local cycling and walking infrastructure plan consultation online, and many have noted this issue in the feedback. However, given the timeframe for the delivery of this plan (2023-2032), and that no guarantee will be given to this issue a solution is needed immediately to keep people safe.