Claims of accidents spurious

Four years ago I complained in these columns about the cost of the proposed Llanymynech/Pant bypass on the grounds (solely) that the existing road was a safe one where hardly any accidents happened.

Subsequent letters pages have heaved with protests from the villages. I was even accused of insulting the memories of those who had died. But when I responded asking for details of these accidents, silence reigned.

I had been a lone voice, but it seems others were listening, and now common sense has prevailed with the abandonment of this ludicrous burden on the taxpayer. Not my doing, surely?

A couple of years on, when a speed camera was installed on the Gobowen Road in Oswestry on the pretext that the road was a death trap, I offered £5 to Hope House in return for details of any serious accidents there.

How much did this bold gesture cost me? Precisely nothing, with an admission from the Speed Camera Partnership that errors had been made.

And today, sitting in my stationary car, gridlocked on the A483 Oswestry bypass, I opened my Shropshire Star to find that the roadworks in which I was sitting were being carried out to reduce accidents on Mile End roundabout.

What accidents? Come on guys, I will up the ante this time and offer a tenner to Hope House for details of any serious accidents at this roundabout since it was built. Is anybody listening?

Sam Evans, Glyn Morlas