Topiary of Terror With Pix

8/6/2019 Topiary of Terror With Pix

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/topiary-of-terror-with-pix 1/3

Topiary of terror as threats made overdeadly footpath

Council demands ‘suicidemission’ over A519 hedge



Road campaigners Leigh Banks and Andrea Martin are furious after Staffordshire County

Council demanded they uncover a deadly stretch of pavement or face court.

The couple are fighting to rid the A519 of four million vehicles a year but have been toldthat it’s their hedge putting villagers’ lives at risk.

Leigh said: “I can’t believe it – there are cars crashing in to houses along this road, cars

turning over, an HGV skidding down the road on it side. But the only clear and presentdanger as far as the council is concerned is our hedge.

“The letter says that the hedge is likely to ‘endanger pedestrians and likely to obstruct

pedestrians. You will be held liable for any claims or damages which arise due to the

condition of the hedge’.

“They are asking us to undertake a suicide mission. Very often there is one HGV a

minute thundering by – and we get six or seven hundred vehicles an hour at times.

“They expect us to stand in the road on ladders and cut back a 15 feet long 30 ft high

hedge . It’s not even safe to stand in the road at weekends, because then we are hit by a

plague of speeding motorcyclists and joyriders.

“Health and Safety stops the authorities from even carrying out speed checks in this part

of the village but it seems okay for us to go and stand in the road with a pair of clippersand a ladder. Maybe this is a plan to get rid of us … ”

Leigh and Andrea are particularly furious as the pavement the council wants to uncover is

less than 24 inches wide: “You couldn’t walk along it in safety let alone push a babychair along it,” Leigh said. “Believe me – it would be like playing Russian roulette for

pedestrians. The county council knows this … and if they don’t know, then they should

hang their heads in shame once more.”



Bill Cash MP and Staffordshire county councillor Marc Winnington have joined the fight

to rescue the historic A519 after it was revealed that Staffordshire county council areallowing millions a year to use this non-primary road.

Residents along the twenty mile road from Hanchurch, Staffordshire, to Newport inShropshire say they have suffered almost five years of hell after the county council

redirected the traffic from the A518, the primary route through the county.

Andrea said: “This is what the county council sees as safety on a road like this – enticing people to walk on a narrow footpath …

“If you look at the hedge it is almost like topiary – it’s perfectly cut into the shape of an

HGV. That’s because the pavement is so narrow large wagons overhang it and keep thehedge back. Wing mirrors on this stretch reach over the full width of the pavement. It’s a

killer.

“What an insult. I’ve boarded up the front of my house and removed the front door

because 44 tonne vehicles climb on the pavement outside it each day to pass each other.

They are inches away from where my door used to be … and yet the council is worriedabout inches of pavement and a rather neatly cut hedge.

“Are these really the people who are running our lives and deciding what is important?Just down the road a woman takes her life and those of her children into her hands every

time she leaves her home on a blind bend, a policeman’s wife pounds her bedroom floor

in the early hours as the HGVs begin their 4am onslaught through the village and pre-school children who are tied together to cross the A519 without even a traffic warden.

“I think the county council should take us to court and we’ll reveal the true story abouttheir attitude to the A519. Idiots.”

Documents

Topiary of Terror With Pix