What is traffic management?

There are two ideas behind traffic management (TM): protection and deterrence.

1. Protection. We need to protect our pedestrians from vehicles like the one in the photograph. Dozens of frustrated drivers break the law and drive up our pavements every day because the road is too narrow.

We hope you will support us and North Somerset Council (NSC) in our efforts to do something about this dangerous behaviour.

2. Deterrence. The other idea is to make the route through Banwell even worse than it is already. Because, if you're really delayed, maybe you'll choose to go another way next time.

We think that this is a terrible idea. Because it penalises all drivers, even those who have to use this route including local residents, school buses and the emergency services.

It seems to us that the thinking behind traffic management is, at best, muddled.

However, with all its faults, TM is all that North Somerset, has to offer. It had a chance to bid for a bypass four years ago but put this off because it wanted to show that it had tried everything else first.

Reluctantly the people of Banwell agreed to this. We did so partly because we're desperate enough to try anything! However we also believed that NSC would soon see that TM offers no real solutions and would then accept that the case for a bypass is overwhelming.

What we couldn't have guessed was that it would take North Somerset over 1300 working days and over £200,000 of public money to get their big idea into place! This is it: a few speed bumps and wooden sleepers!

And now it wants to monitor traffic speed for the next few months to decide whether TM 'works'!

Slowing down traffic that is already virtually at a standstill seems like a bizarre idea to the people of Banwell. Especially when the answer is obvious. It's staring us in the face.

Banwell needs a bypass!