No more excuses...how many kids must be hurt? (From Gazette)

No more excuses...how many kids must be hurt?

5:00pm Tuesday 20th December 2011 in Colchester By Andrea Collitt

Campaigning councillor Dave Harris

A CAMPAIGN for road safety improvements outside Colchester’s Gilberd School has been widenened across the borough after two more children were injured outside schools.

A boy, ten, sustained minor injuries after he was hit by a Ford Fiesta in Rectory Hill, Wivenhoe, on his way to Millfields Primary School on Friday.

A day earlier a girl, eight, was flown to hospital with pelvic and arm injuries after she was crushed under a car in School Road, near Monkwick Junior School, Colchester.

She is expected to spend Christmas in hospital.

A safety campaign was launched in October after Sumika Purchase, 11, was hit by a car as she walked home from the Gilberd School, in High Woods. Her leg was broken in two places.

Gerard Oxford, borough councillor for High Woods, has been campaigning for two pedestrian crossings to be installed in Brinkley Grove Road since Sumika’s accident.

After the latest incidents, Mr Oxford and other councillors have called for Essex County Council to pay for safety measures on school routes across Colchester.

A petition started at the Gilberd School is being circulated across the borough.

Mr Oxford, an Independent councillor, said: “Essex County Council needs to wake up to this and do something positive, like providing pedestrian crossings and road safety measures protecting youngsters going to and from school. How many more children have to get hurt?”

Dave Harris, Berechurch ward councillor, backed Mr Oxford’s calls. He said: “Children’s safety is not to be second rate.

“The council has got to put children’s safety as a priority and budgets must come second.”

Mr Harris, a Labour councillor, has started a petition to have a lollipop lady reinstated on Monkwick Avenue. He also wants either yellow lines or road closures to be in place from 8.30am to 9.30am and from 2.30pm to 3.30pm on weekdays in School Road.

Julie Young, county and borough councillor for Wivenhoe, raised the issue of road safety at a recent meeting at County Hall.

Mrs Young said road safety on Rectory Hill had been a concern to residents for some time because it is used by large lorries going to quarries.

She has also been campaiging for 20mph speed limits outside the town’s two schools.

Labour councillor Mrs Young said: “I will certainly redouble my efforts in light of the accident.”

Essex County Council previously said installing a crossing in Brinkley Grove Road was not a priority.