Road safety fears over new school

Councillors have sent education bosses back to the drawing board after telling them that the parking arrangements for a planned new primary school on the outskirts of Preston are devoid of “common sense”.

Lancashire County Council’s development control committee had been asked to grant permission for the long-proposed facility on the former Whittingham Hospital site, off Whittingham Lane.

However, members condemned the design of a drop-off/pick-up point outside the school gates and a coach turning area where the vehicles would be required to reverse – branding them both a potential danger.

The education arm of the authority will now have to rethink those elements of its blueprint for the 420-pupil school, which includes a 16-place special needs unit and is due to open in September 2027.

As the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) revealed last month, temporary buildings are to be erected on the site so that 60 reception-aged children can be accommodated 12 months sooner than that – during the 2026/27 academic year – after delivery of the permanent school was delayed.

Now the project has hit a further bump in the road after the cross-party committee excoriated the traffic management plans for the site on Henry Littler Way, the new road that will eventually run right through the huge housing estate being built on the wider one-time hospital plot.

Under the proposal brought forward by county council education chiefs, a 22-space layby would be created close to the entrance to the school, where parents and carers could set down and collect their children at the start and end of each school day.

However, the committee expressed concern that drivers leaving the parking area would then be inclined to perform u-turns in the street in order to head back out onto Whittingham Lane –  rather than continue in the same direction they were facing and take what would be a mile-long trip along the full length of Henry Littler Way to emerge on other side of the estate on Cumeragh Lane.

County Cllr Maria Jones, a committee member who also represents the Preston Rural division where the new school is to be built, said it was “absolutely essential” to provide a designated turning area – such as a mini-roundabout – in order to prevent chaotic ad-hoc three-point manoeuvres being made by motorists in an area where so many children will be present.

“This needs more planning and careful consideration – health and safety here is not satisfactory. We can’t go ahead with this [in its current form],” County Cllr Jones warned.

Similar fears about u-turns were contained within the total of 38 public objections made to the overarching proposal. They also formed part of a submission from Whittingham Parish Council, which, like the development control committee, accepted the need for the school itself.

Neil Stevens, Lancashire County Council’s highway development control manager, said that “something more” than a mini-roundabout would be required in order to create the dedicated turning space that several members were seeking.

He explained that he had been “an advocate” for a “limited one-way section” of road being developed within the school site – through which vehicles could pass to pick up or drop off children, before turning back out onto Henry Littler Way in whichever direction they liked.

However, he told the committee that while the education department had considered that option, it had been discounted because of the need, under government legislation, for all new developments to generate a “net gain” in biodiversity of 10 percent compared to what the land offered beforehand.   The off-street system was deemed to take up too much of the green space required to meet that environmental demand.

Nevertheless, Mr. Stevens said he was satisfied, from a safety standpoint, with the set-up that had ultimately been proposed instead.

“There’s always an engineering solution [to a problem], but it may require a brand new application – it may require everything starting from scratch again.

“We’ve got something from my perspective that I…believe works – and if there is a problem, it’s then on my shoulders,” he added.

County Cllr Jones said that the current proposal “may be satisfactory to Mr Stevens, but it certainly does not pass the common sense test”.

“I’m…both surprised and disappointed that during the developing phase of this project…they never thought about u-turns…it had to come to this committee for us to point it out.”

Jonathan Edwards, the county council’s director for environment and planning, stressed that the issues raised by the committee had been considered during the “conversation” between his independent planning team and the education wing of the authority – and that the professional advice from the highways department was that the resultant design was adequate.

However, he added that it was “really important that there’s a distinction between the planning authority and the wider council [when it is the latter] submitting an application”.

“What we don’t want to be accused of is that, actually, this is just [one part of the county council] submitting any old application that we’re just going to rubber stamp,” Mr. Edwards said.

There was little danger of that, as committee members lined up to criticise what was on the table.

County Cllr Adrian Owens said that a “permanent” solution was needed to the turning issue, because parents would not be willing to travel all the way through the estate “if they’re going in the other direction into work”.

His colleague, County Cllr Tom Lord, questioned whether motorists could be forced to do so by making Henry Littler Way a one-way route – but Neil Stevens said that would simply encourage “poor driver behaviour elsewhere”.

“Parents will drop off wherever,” he added.

Meanwhile, County Cllr Owens also alighted upon the fact that an area for coaches to park up within the school site had been designed in such a way that they would be forced to reverse in order to negotiate the space.

He said that the opportunity provided by the “blank canvass” of building a brand new school – to create a coach area that did not require vehicles to back up – had been squandered.

“If there was ever an incident, I think the county council would be criticised,” he warned.

Mr. Stevens responded that while reversing of large vehicles on school sites was “typical” – and, in the case of the new Whittingham school, would be in area reserved for the purpose – it was open to the committee to demand that a “banksman” always be deployed to monitor the area and act as a safety check when it was in use.

Committee members’ dismay at the design they were being recommended by planning officers’ to approve was evident throughout the hour-long debate.

County Cllr Shaun Crimmins called for “better planning [for] schools in future”, while County Cllr Clive Balchin commented that after just 130 days as member of the authority, he had already “had enough of experts”.

Committee members ultimately resolved to defer their decision on the application in order to request that the authority consider coming up with new proposals for the drop-off/pick up location and the coach turning area, as a result of “concerns…[over] highway safety”.

Jonathan Edwards said that if “minor adjustments” could be made that “wouldn’t compromise the overall design” of the school, then the timeframe for completing the project should not be constrained.

The matter will be brought back to the committee for them to have their final say at a later date.

Just 24 hours after that decision on Wednesday, the county council’s cabinet approved the funding for the school.   The sum – which is being kept confidential at this stage – will be made up of an amount from the authority’s own budget, together with contributions from housing developers who have built properties in the area which have stimulated demand for the facility.

Government rules mean the new school must be established as an academy, but an operator has yet to be agreed.

CAR CALCULATIONS

Once the new Whittingham school is at its full capacity of 420 pupils – which will take seven years to reach, with two new reception classes of 30 children each being admitted each year – it is estimated it could generate more than 200 new vehicle trips of both a morning and afternoon.

However, it is thought that that figure could be cut by around 15 percent, because so many of the pupils will be coming from the up to 900 homes being built across the former Whittingham Hospital site –  meaning that a significant number of them may walk to class.

A report presented to the development control committee said that the estate includes “off-road pedestrian/active travel routes that link various parts of the site” and so would further encourage walking rather than driving.

Nevertheless, the catchment area for the school will extend to Longridge and Goosnargh, where traffic concerns forced the county council in May to drop plans to expand Goosnargh Oliverson’s Church of England Primary School.

It was that move that led to the capacity of the new Whittingham facility being returned to 420 – as previously proposed – after being reduced to half that level when a planning application was first submitted in February.

Highways development control manager Neil Stevens said he wants to see traffic calming measures such as speed humps installed on Henry Littler Way to help enforce the 20mph limit to be put in place once the route is officially adopted.   He also said he would seek to project junctions and existing driveways from dangerous and inconsiderate parking by imposing traffic regulation orders.

The report to the committee acknowledged that the school will “generate a considerable volume of car traffic, although for comparatively short periods of the day”.

It suggested that in addition to the proposed pick-up/drop-off layby, “there appears to be scope for parking elsewhere on Henry Littler Way without resulting in major traffic or amenity issues”.