Closed
Holtspur Avenue/Five Acres junction
Sent to Buckinghamshire Council less than a minute later. FixMyStreet ref: 4626755.
There are no dropped kerbs at this junction. As a consequence an elderly gentleman on a mobility scooter, who was on a circular ‘walk’ with able-bodied relatives, was suddenly brought to a halt. We discovered that halfway down Five Acres there is vehicular access to the back of the houses, so he drove down the incline to that location, but as he tried to negotiate between road and pavement on the steep slope, the scooter tipped over and he fell to the ground, injuring his arm on impact. Fortunately there were 3 of us to assist him and we were able to get him and his scooter onto the pavement to complete his journey. I believe that Disability Legislation requires that street junctions should have dropped kerbs to enable those using wheelchairs or mobility scooters to cross the road. Please would you put this matter right before someone else is injured. PLEASE NOTE: the only other option for our relative would have been to backtrack as far as the shop on Holtspur Avenue and then make a detour along the middle of the road itself (owing to parked cars on both sides). This would have been extremely hazardous as vehicles are quite frequent along this road.
Updates
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This has been passed to the local area technician to investigate the enquiry/issue regarding the kerb.
They will carry out an inspection within the next 10 working days and if required arrange to resolve the issue.
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Update
Buckinghamshire Council is very conscious of the accessibility needs of some residents and appreciate the frustration and difficulty experienced by wheelchair users and other mobility impairments in trying to use parts of our footway network.
We know that not all of the 2,400 km of footways and pedestrian crossings adhere to the latest accessibility standards, as they were constructed many years ago prior to today's legislation. With the budget we have to repair and upgrade footways and crossings, we are not able to bring the historic network up to standard as quickly as we would like, nor are we required to do so by law.
We fully recognise the importance of making our footpaths accessible for everyone and any new construction carried out does comply with the latest accessibility standard including the installation of new crossing or upgrading footways.
Please be assured we are working as hard as we can to upgrade the whole network, but this will unfortunately take a number of years.
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