Angry Burnham-On-Sea town councillors have this week attacked plans to introduce a speed warning sign along a quiet stretch of road in the town as “absolutely pointless.”

A flashing speed sign similar to this will be introduced along Marine DriveBurnham-On-Sea.com reported in May that a speed sign is to be introduced along Marine Drive in an effort to crack down on speeding motorists – and this week Somerset County Council provided more details, stating that its preferred location would be between the roundabout at Burnham Road and Highburn Close, pictured above.

The news was greeted with dismay from town councillors who believe this stretch of Marine Drive does not suffer from speeding problems, therefore making the proposed sign ineffective.

Cllr Neville Jones said the location would be “absolutely wrong.” He added that “motorists rarely do more than 35mph along this stretch – it needs to repositioned elsewhere.”

And Cllr Louise Parkin said the camera should be sited in the middle of Marive Drive, near the entrance to Burnham Holiday Village, where “speeding problems are at their worst.”

She added: “It’s absolutely pointless putting a camera near the roundabout.”

Chris Betty, the County Council’s Traffic Engineer, who is in charge of the project, said: “We may choose an alternative site should the location identified not be practicable for whatever reason.”

It was also confirmed that the sign would flash the actual speed of approaching vehicles and would record the figures in an internal database which may be passed to local police. However, no vehicle registration numbers are to be stored.

“The sign cannot be used in any way to assist in the prosecution of a speeding motorist,” explained Mr Betty. “But of course the actual speed data itself can be shared with the police and this may prompt a future visit by an officer for enforcement purposes.”

He added: “The flashing and monitoring aspect of the sign has been shown in trials to be very effective in reducing traffic speed, and we hope that this will contribute to prompting a change in behaviour for vehicles.”

The issue was discussed at this week’s meeting of the Burnham and Highbridge Town Improvements Committee.

 
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