DRIVEN MAD
We’re fuming after our council BANNED cars from our posh housing estate – they want to fix school traffic but it’s worse
POSH homeowners are fuming after a council banned cars from their housing estate - yet failed to fix school traffic chaos.
Parents have been descending on a cul-de-sac behind Templars Primary School in Coventry for the last 30 years.
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The feud ignited in the 1990s when the school's back gate opened - to the horror of those living on Knights Templar Way.
Some 60 cars pile into the cul-de-sac every morning and afternoon to pick up and drop off hundreds of children.
One father Frank David, 39, who parked on the street to collect his daughter, said: "If they don’t want us parking here then they should close the gate but if everyone went to the front, it would be chaos on the road and for everyone.
"It makes no sense. We are only here for 10 minutes and if you are not blocking anyone in I don’t see the problem."
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Labour-run Coventry City Council has taken desperate measures to try to keep the peace, a ‘Car Free Streets’ scheme.
It has banned cars from the street for an hour in the morning and afternoon.
But homeowners say the plan has backfired - with parents blatantly ignoring "no car" signs.
One school mum, who did not want to be named, said: "I have paid my road tax and this is not a private road.
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"The residents need to get over themselves. We’re only here for 10 minutes and there is nothing that will stop me coming here to pick up my kids.
"They have to give you 10 minutes waiting time so if I’m not blocking anyone and there are no yellow lines, there is nothing they can do.
"I don’t mind having a shouting match every day. The alternative is too dangerous to contemplate."
One campaigner said a previous plan to make the street resident permit parking only from 8am to 9am and 3pm to 4pm failed.
Council traffic wardens had to wait ten minutes before issuing tickets - allowing parents to get in and out without fines.
But the new scheme will be enforced by police, meaning fines can be issued immediately, he added.
Footage shot in September last years shows carnage along the road as parents pull up with their children.
One of the home owners said: "They tell us we shouldn’t have bought next to a school but when this development went up in the late 1990s the primary school didn’t have a back gate.
"Once all the houses were sold, they opened one up and that’s when the trouble started. We’ve been complaining for 20 years.
"It’s getting worse and worse. Twice a day it is carnage with 50 to 60 cars using the pavement as a road to get past one another. It’s dangerous."
The only alternative, the front gate of the 631-pupil school, opens onto a busy main road.
Parents say cars regularly flout the 30mph speed limit.
A set of traffic lights only make the problem worse - as desperate drivers speed up to make it through before they turn red.
And a lone lollipop lady admits she fears for her life.
Jan Nicholl, 66, who has been helping children cross the road for seven years, said: "The lollipop lady before me was knocked over and didn’t come back to work.
"I have lost count of the times I have nearly been hit. Every day, there will be a driver go past with me in the road.
"To be fair, the lorry drivers are the most considerate and there’s a lot of them, but the cars need to be slowed down. It’s a scary road and it’s no wonder parents don’t fancy crossing it."
Jan’s husband Andrew, 69, walks her to work every day.
"I really do worry about her," he said. "It’s a very scary road."
The pavement is just as dangerous.
In 2018, Andrew suffered two cracked ribs when he was knocked down by a push bike.
That same year, five year old Keira Hunt was almost blinded when she was knocked down by another bike on the pavement.
Her mum Kirsty, 33, said: ‘She was playing with her friend, went towards him and a bike knocked her to the floor.
"The wheel must have brushed against her eye. The kids rode off shouting abuse and the school called us an ambulance.
"I was told that the boys on bikes had been advised to use the pavement by the police because the road is so dangerous. It’s been five years and something needs sorting out."
The Council plan to make the area by the school a temporary 20mph zone with flashing signs to warn motorists.
But local Councillor Marcus Lapsa said more needed to be done: "They need proper traffic calming measures," he said. "Either an island in the middle of the road to help with crossing or pelican lights or speed bumps.
"I hear about all the near misses and it is frightening to think what it will take before something is done.
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"There’s already been a lollipop lady knocked over and I don’t think a temporary, unenforceable 20mph zone is enough."
The Sun has contacted Coventry City Council and Templars Primary School for comment.
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