TERMINAL SICKNESS

Traffic has always been a problem in Woodseaves. In the 1950s people probably
complained about Joe Beeston’s rickety old travelling shop and later on about Stan
Robinson’s then-small fleet of delivery wagons.

Over the decades people have tried to do something about it, tacit protests, the
occasional letters to the papers, complaints to the council and of course to our MP Mr
Bill Cash. But nothing has happened. And that’s why we’ve ended up where we are
today – a village torn apart by the tyranny of transport.

There was one bit of action, taken about 15 years ago. The council put in streetlights
and white lines along the sides of the carriageway. What this did was turn the road
into a big Scalextric kit for grown-ups. Certainly, the 30mph speed limit has become
a thing of the past and so has the sanctity of our homes. Literally hundreds of 40-
tonne six-axle trucks – trucks that dwarf houses – trucks that shake our floorboards
and rattle the pans on your shelves - smash through the village day and night, seven
days a week.

The real problem is that the new breed of truck now using the Woodseaves Racetrack
is just too big for the safety and the sanity of the people who live here. The wagons
can’t even pass each other without mounting the pavements.

They are crushing the pavements and eating away at the embankments along the full
length of the road. In places they’ve stolen almost two feet. In others you can see
where they have mounted the embankment so high that tree roots are exposed.

Take a look at the number of road kills too – I counted seven dead animals on the
way to Newport today. It was either a bad day for wildlife or a direct consequence of
the increase in traffic.

I don’t want to be dramatic – but if the traffic is killing more animals in the A519 –
then when will it become people again? A lot of people have already died on this
road. Whatever … these trucks are systematically killing our village.

But there is also a sinister development beyond the noise, the pollution, the damage
and the danger: Threats.
 Yesterday, I was driving along the A519 assiduously sticking to the 30mph limit
when a massive gravel truck loomed up behind me doing maybe 60mph, blasting his
air horns and flashing his lights. I was in his way and travelling too slowly.

I assume he hit his brakes at the last moment instead of hitting me – but that caused
him to temporarily loose control of his mammoth vehicle, shooting it across the
carriageway into the opposite lane. Somehow, he recovered and overtook me. If
anybody had been actually coming in the other direction, it is feasible we would all be
dead.

This is not an isolated occurrence either. Villagers who insist on travelling at 30mph
are overtaken, threatened, sworn at and abused all day long in The Village of The
Damned.