Pavement Plan for Reading Schools Scrapped!

A plan to add a pavement on Hamilton Road in East Reading to help pupils get to nearby schools has been shelved.

Hamilton Road links Whiteknights Road to Wokingham Road and is used by pupils heading to Maiden Erlegh School and UTC Reading via the Bulmershe Road track. Hamilton School, a special educational needs school for 11-18s, sits between the Whiteknights and Bulmershe junctions.

Only the western side of Hamilton Road has a pavement. Councillor Rob White (Green, Park) asked for a new footpath on the eastern side years ago, before Hamilton School opened in January 2020.

The council's traffic management sub-committee has removed the proposal from its "request for traffic management measures" list, effectively rejecting it.

James Penman, the council's network services manager, said: "We're hoping to remove Hamilton Road because of the feasibility and unknown costs associated with that."

The three Green Party councillors on the committee abstained because the footway request was dropped. Cllr White said: "It is very disappointing that the Labour-run council has dropped this school road safety scheme from the programme. The Crescent Road education site now has four schools on it, and this scheme would have provided a missing section of pavement on the east side of Hamilton Road, at the junction with Whiteknights Road. This would help keep children and young people travelling to and from these schools safely on the pavement, rather than having to walk in the road at an already very busy junction. Green councillors will keep working to improve road safety. Every child should have a safe route to school."

During the meeting, cllr Will Cross (Labour, Redlands) said: "I was sorry to hear that opposition green councillors feel the need to abstain on this, rather than vote in favour of this list. Hopefully that means that they won't be taking credit from the Labour administration in delivering these schemes in their wards when they come to be implemented."

The removal was agreed by the traffic management sub-committee on September 10.

James Aldridge, Local Democracy Reporter