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library bollard 2014Bollards! Why are the bollards in Queens Road made of plastic? They are designed in this insubstantial material and sprung from a metal device beneath them so that when hit by a careless driver they pop out effectively, causing no damage to the car, van or lorry. Why this is a priority I cannot imagine!

Last year one was hit outside Hetherington’s Estate Agents at the cross roads mid Queens Road. It missed their glass window by an inch as it flew through the air thanks to the thoughtless driver who wanted to pull up onto the pavement. Personally a large dent in their car would have seemed more reasonable than the possible injury that could have occurred had it broken the glass. Funnily enough the dent to the window frame appeared not to have bothered him either!

Heatheringtons kept the bollard expecting Essex Highways to fetch it and in this case, with no actual breakage of the bollard, pop it back into the hole. If you walk down Queens Road you can find several bollards missing and evidently not ‘popped back’ and saving money.

No-one came for this one in the following months and now Heatheringtons has closed to move the Loughton. The bollard…. Who knows. I wonder if they took it with them!

The bollard that has concerned me most is outside Insight, opposite the Library. In 2014 I reported this missing in the October as I was particularly concerned about our Christmas event. Children were due to be singing close to this hole and a small foot can fit awfully well into one of these. Toes sliced by the metal spring would be awful. I sent a photograph, as I was also concerned that the plastic had snapped off and had left a sharp piece pointing up as well. A trip hazard as well. I was pleased that a few days before the event the bollard was replaced. But guess what….

Here we are again. In June 2016 the bollard was hit again by a van pulling up (not the one in the picture), it has the spring gleaming in the hole and the nasty spike of plastic protruding. I assumed that surely as it was June this would be dealt with before this year’s Christmas event. But here we are in October and no it hasn’t!

Today I spoke to a very nice lady at Essex Highways on 0345 603 7631 – rather than contacting her via the website which is, of course, preferred – www.essexhighways.org/report-a-problem.aspx . She used a satellite map to examine the spot and very much agreed in the danger of the situation in terms of accidents. Looking back over records she saw that a ‘road walk’ had been done in August by a member of staff whose role is to gather information about road & pavement repairs needed. At first she said that this must have happened since that walk or he surley would have noticed it. Then she saw that the map she was studying had been made by those useful satellites, was made in June 2016! She said he would note it to be dealt with as an emergency and went away to do so. Sadly because the man did not note the hole – it is not an emergency after all! A careless man can dictate what requires repair!

We have dozens of small children and their families coming to Queens Road on 2nd December. Let’s see if we can get that somewhat short sighted or careless inspector to come back before then and arrange a swift repair before it is a person who requires it!

Ring the number above – let’s get BH fixed!

Margaret Drew

Library bollard 2016Van on Pavement 2016