Road safety vow

Both Wolverley High School and Wolverley Sebright First School will take on more pupils when the reorganisation from a three-tier system to a two-tier system takes place in 2007.

In a recent Shuttle/Times & News article, former Wyre Forest district councillor, Nigel Addison, said the county council needed to take action to improve the routes to the schools, as he feared there could be safety problems because of the increase in pupil numbers.

County councillor, Gordon Yarranton, said he wanted parents to know that the county council and Wolverley and Cookley Parish Council had been looking at the issue for three months and a consultation process was under way.

He said: "We are fully aware of the number of children that are coming into the school in 2007. We have been talking about this for some time.

"Everybody wants to know their kids are going to school safely. All I want to do is let people know that we are dealing with it."

He said improvement schemes drawn up by the county council included a new pedestrian gateway and footway to improve pedestrian access to and along Blakeshall Lane.

The footpath alongside Blakeshall Lane from the village towards Wolverley High School would also be widened to 1.8metres and in the grounds of the high school there would be road markings for the coaches.

There were plans to widen the footpath along the Wolverley Road near Sebright First School and hedgerows along both school routes would also be cleared.

Mr Yarranton said: "I am amazed Mr Addison did not know this. He could have visited the parish council meetings and been fully aware of it instead of scaremongering the parents."

He added that the plans were on the agenda for the next parish council meeting on Tuesday and after the meeting they would go out for public consultation and there would be a police safety report before the plans were implemented in December.