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Dover Avenue cul-de-sac to become a foot and cycleway to new estate
18/07/2024
A footpath already exists to the new estate from the next cul-de-sac along the road
Plans to convert a section of grassland on Dover Avenue in Banbury into a shared use foot and cycleway have been approved.
The small grassed cul-de-sac at the top of Bretch Hill has been used for pedestrian access to homes and historically butted up against farmland.
With the new Withycombe Farm development having been created on those fields the proposal aims to give cyclists and walkers a defined safe route through from the new estate to the existing walking and cycling network.
But some local residents are not happy and pointed out that an existing public footpath runs from another cul-de-sac in Dover Avenue just a little further down the road.
One responded to a consultation saying: “This will impact myself [and] my wife who are both 80 [and] my neighbours who are in their late 70s. This is an accident waiting to happen.
“There is access to this development in the next cul-de-sac which has always been there as it is a public footpath.”
Banbury Civic Society questioned the need specifically for allowing cyclists to ride through. They said: “Is it really such an inconvenience for cyclists to dis-mount and walk the length of this link in order to ensure that pedestrians, especially young children, are not put in harms way?”
But officers at Oxfordshire County Council stood by the decision to position the shared use foot and cycleway at this point on Dover Avenue. They wrote: “The cycle track was asked for at the planning stages of the development – and is to be one of the primary pedestrian and cycle access points, which would be no less safe here than any other location…
“The use of the alternative location suggested (i.e. running adjacent to Nos 39-45 Dover Avenue) is not currently a cycle-path, and as such would require similar amendments/improvements to make it a viable option, whilst also not being identified as one of the ley access points.”
Councillor Judy Roberts this morning approved the proposal during a meeting at County Hall.
Published: by Banbury FM Newsteam
John On 18/07/2024 at 5:43 pm
There existing path on Dover Ave is not currently usable as a cycle path, because it is blocked at one end by pedestrian gating fences that prevent riding a bicycle through it. And as shown by the photo, currently used for car-parking. The same objections one group of residents have to the use being changed to a cycle route, apply to both. A Cycle route is needed here, due to a dangerous blind corner on a hill for the existing route north.