Council under fire over traffic chaos

3:20pm Thursday 28th August 2008

Comments (0)   Have your say »

TRAFFIC chaos in Kidderminster was caused by the county council’s “irresponsible” decision to carry out road resurfacing at the same time as a major road closure, according to residents.

Rob Whale, a retired accountant, of Chester Road South, said the traffic would have flowed “moderately freely” last week if the closure of Worcester Road to northbound traffic had not been combined with work to resurface Chester Road North.

He explained: “It was chaos. It was totally and utterly irresponsible of the council to carry out road resurfacing at the same time as a major traffic diversion is in place.”

Graham Ballinger, Liberal Worcestershire county councillor, said: “Why the council doesn’t have the work done at night-time is unbelievable. This is going to go on for two months.

“It’s a disaster and someone needs to take responsibility for it. What is going to happen at the end of the school holidays?”

A Worcestershire County Council spokeswoman explained that the resurfacing works on Chester Road were due to be completed at the start of last week but delays resulted in the works continuing longer than anticipated.