Bishop’s Stortford North Consortium confirms key roads on Stortford Fields will be gritted
Developers responsible for thousands of new homes at Bishop’s Stortford North (BSN) have said they will grit icy roads after the Indie intervened.
The decision by the consortium representing Stortford Fields housebuilders follows protests by the head of Avanti Grange secondary school Rhys Jones, Herts county councillor Alastair Ward-Booth and estate residents about salting Newland Avenue.
The road used by students making their way to the secondary and to Avanti Brook primary was the scene of a “narrow miss” last week when a car skidded on the untreated road, mounted the kerb and crashed into a garden.
Mr Jones said he had raised the issue of gritting the thoroughfare between Stortford Fields and St Michael’s Hurst with Hertfordshire County Council (HCC), which is the highways authority, and the developers, but to no avail.
“The school has been informed by HCC that Hertfordshire Highways cannot undertake the gritting on the road as it remains unadopted,” he said. “They too have been pressing the consortium to undertake the gritting but have received the same answer that the consortium has decided not to do it. The school continues to stress the urgent need for a resolution to both HCC and the BSN Consortium.”
A spokesman for the county council backed his view and a frustrated Cllr Ward-Booth said he too had contacted the consortium but had not received “a substantive response”.
The Conservative member for Bishop’s Stortford West said he had asked HCC officials if there was a way to compel the consortium to grit the roads with an option to provide salt to Avanti Grange and residents as a last resort.
However, on Monday (January 15) a spokeswoman for BSN said: “We recognise that there have been recent instances of cold weather and we have made provision for key roads, such as those serving local schools, to be gritted privately. This will align with the efforts of HCC and will, we hope, help to reduce accidents during this inclement weather, although we would also encourage drivers to take extra care during this time.”
Dawn Reynolds, the mum of two Avanti Grange students, contacted the Indie after the accident last Thursday (January 11).
Hertfordshire police confirmed officers were sent to the scene at around 7.50am after the damage-only collision involving a grey Citroen C1 and a white BMW. Newland Avenue was blocked by the incident.
Dawn said: “The car has mounted the kerb and pavement and come to a halt in a resident’s front garden. From the skidmarks on the road that I and many parents will have seen driving past this morning, it is clear that this car skidded on the ice on the untreated (not gritted) road.”
She called for “commonsense to prevail” and for Newland Avenue, also the site of a care home for the elderly, to be salted during bad weather.
A spokesman for HCC said: “Newland Avenue is an unadopted/private road and therefore not the county council’s responsibility to maintain or grit. If, at some point in the future, the road is adopted as part of the public highway network we would consider adding it to our gritting routes, but as it stands it’s not our road and is the developers’ responsibility.”
Development at Bishop’s Stortford North – the Stortford Fields and St Michael’s Hurst estates – was included in the 2018 East Herts District Plan.
Persimmon Homes, Taylor Wimpey, Tilia (formerly Kier Living) and Vistry (incorporating Bovis) form the consortium responsible for delivering more than 2,200 homes at Stortford Fields. Countryside Properties is developing almost 500 homes at St Michael’s Hurst. Building is expected to continue until 2033.
Along with Avanti Grange and Avanti Brook, the Avanti Meadows primary off Farnham Road has been built to offer education from nursery to sixth-form for the estates’ children.
