Speeding on Marshfield Road, increased traffic as a result of the Peterstone and Duffryn road closure diversions and traffic congestion around Marshfield Primary continue to be a concern of ours.
We have been liaising with the Police and Newport Council to endeavour to highlight and alleviate the issues and find some remedies. The Police attended the December Council meeting and advised that they have increased their presence outside Marshfield Primary and will be issuing fixed penalty notices for illegal parking. Speeding tickets have also been issued recently on Marshfield Road.
Newport City Council have advised that the traffic calming measures employed in Marshfield are speed cushions, which are the standard feature used in schemes throughout Newport. They advise, “That the reason such measures are used is that they are preferred by emergency services as they do not have a significant impact upon response times. Invariably the emergency services will object to any scheme employing more significant measures for this very reason. Furthermore, speed cushions have the advantage of reducing potential noise intrusion for those living in proximity to them, as they can be straddled by larger vehicles.”
“The scheme was introduced some time ago as part of a planning condition for a residential development in the village, and was wholly funded by the developer. The present financial situation is far from favourable in terms of utilising public finances to provide new schemes, let alone to change existing ones.
The Council does not have an allocated budget for traffic calming, and if funding is not met from external sources, it has historically relied upon grant funding from the Welsh Government to provide new schemes in the form of the Local Road Safety Schemes Grant. To obtain such funding, Newport City Council must submit bids to the regional transport consortium outlining the schemes it wishes to progress. Such bids must then compete with those submitted by other local authorities in the region for the limited funding that is available. The Local Road Safety Schemes Grant cannot be used to fund changes to or maintain existing schemes, which consequently precludes this as an option to fund any amendments to the scheme through Marshfield. Therefore, in view of the complete lack of general funding for road safety schemes and the likelihood of emergency service opposition to more severe traffic calming measures, there is little prospect of any physical changes being made to the traffic calming in Marshfield within the foreseeable future unfortunately.
I can confirm that the cushions installed on Marshfield Road are pre-formed concrete cushions and conform to the relevant standards in terms of their dimensions. Indeed, up until relatively recently, Newport City Council used these types of cushions in all new schemes and where existing measures required replacement.
However, it transpired that these types of cushions proved something of a maintenance liability, and now these are gradually being replaced by bituminous cushions constructed in-situ. Nonetheless, pre-cast concrete cushions can still be found on Usk Road in Caerleon and Beechwood Road.
In the fullness of time these cushions, along with those on Marshfield Road, will in all probability be replaced by bituminous ones when this becomes necessary through maintenance needs. In the meantime, please rest assured that both forms of cushions conform to the centrally imposed regulations design standards by which we are bound.”
Marshfield Community Council will continue to lobby and address on the road safety and congestion issues around Marshfield Primary.