Traders and councillors at odds over bypass benefits

RETAILERS and councillors have clashed over plans to build a relief road in Watlington.

The parish council voted unanimously in favour of recommending Oxfordshire County Council’s application to build the “edge road” on the outskirts of the town is approved by South Oxfordshire District Council, the planning authority.

The county council, the highways authority, says the bypass would encourage drivers to avoid the centre of the historic town and reduce congestion.

The road would run from the western side of Watlington on the B4009, loop northwards and connect back on the eastern side. It would provide access to new and proposed housing developments.

But the town’s independent retailers fear the reduction in traffic will cost them much-needed trade.

Loraine Daniels, who runs lighting shop Bella Luce, told the council meeting: “We really do heavily rely on passing traffic. People will not come up High Street as much. It has been quoted that maybe 50 per cent of the traffic will be cut. Unfortunately, most of us can’t survive on 50 per cent.”

She said that Robin Holmes-Smith, owner of the Granary Delicatessen, was the longest serving retailer on the high street and felt the new road would be devastating for his business.

“The traffic passing through is such a huge bonus to us,” said Ms Daniels. “It’s not that people stop every time, it’s that they drive past and then they come back.”

She said that claims about accidents and the danger from passing traffic in the town centre had been exaggerated and she had not seen any proof.

Ms Daniels also disputed claims that residents voted overwhelmingly for the road and asked that parish and county councillors refrained from saying that businesses had been consulted as it wasn’t true. Councillor Steve Bolingbroke, a volunteer driver, said: “I took a lady to the John Radcliffe Hospital the other day who was telling me how she remembers in 1964 getting signatures on a petition for a bypass.

“Sixty years we’ve been campaigning for this bypass — longer than most of us have been alive. It’s amazing how long we have been at it.

“In 2018, through the hard work of people in this town, we created and passed a neighbourhood plan.

“That plan had a very simple deal at the heart of it: We would have 400 new houses in the town in return for getting a bypass.

“That plan was passed in 2018 with 83 per cent of people voting in favour. That is overwhelming support for the edge road.

“If we decide as a council not to support that bypass after 60 years of campaigning and that vote, it would be a total betrayal of the people of Watlington and we should all resign in disgrace. I understand the retailers have concerns. I’ve listened to them several times making the same case. I don’t expect I’m going to change their minds but the people of Watlington have voted for this and we as a parish council need to support that.”

Councillor Leo Pesci said that sitting in traffic in the town centre was the “biggest annoyance” about Watlington. He suggested the town would be more approachable for pedestrians if traffic was reduced thanks to the edge road.

A corridor for the road was included in the adopted Watlington neighbourhood development plan and in 2020 was designated as a safeguarded route in the South Oxfordshire local plan.

The road design features two roundabouts, one T-junction, three shared-use zebra crossings and walking and cycling infrastructure.

The county council would share responsibility for different parts of the road with developers Bloor Homes and Redrow.