BROMSGROVE District Council’s Chief Executive will be writing to Worcestershire County Council to express concerns about the Local Transport Plan 4 (LTP4) which has now gone out to consultation.
It follows a unanimously-backed motion at Wednesday’s full council meeting tabled by Labour leader Coun Luke Mallett.
Coun Mallett said there were a catalogue of errors with the plan itself even before it was put before the public.
These, he said, included county council representatives bringing an Ordinance Survey map for the wrong town to the Bromsgrove District Council consultation event and then, he added, when the right map was laid out, all the proposed housing was marked off in the wrong places and some of the planned properties were not included.
He said, with a 97 per cent increase in traffic using the district’s roads between now and 2030, the plan did nothing to address the infrastructure needs.
“The district council is saying ‘let’s have homes on the west side of Bromsgrove’ and the county council is saying ‘let’s improve all the roads on the east.
“The western by-pass should have been planned and passed years ago and it could have been built by now – instead all Highways have done is produce a report giving reasons why there should not be one.
“It has been a farce from start to finish – the best thing they could do is withdraw this insufficient, short-sighted, ill put-together document and go back to the drawing board.”
But, Coun Mallett said, if the authority was persisting with LTP4, every resident in Bromsgrove should make sure they had their say on it and make it clear to Highways bosses that something needs to be done to reduce the district’s traffic problems.
Coun Dr Ken Pollock, cabinet member for Economy, Skills and Infrastructure, said: “The local transport plan 4 (LTP 4) is a draft strategic document which is currently being consulted on.
“We therefore welcome all comments and urge Bromsgrove District Council to feed back their concerns as part of this consultation.
“If further information or clarification is required I am happy to respond directly to any letter from Kevin Dicks.”
The consultation runs until March 17 and the finalised plan will be submitted to the cabinet in the summer.
Residents should visit www.worcestershire.gov.uk/LTP or Bromsgrove Library to see the plan and have their say.
