Broomhill School Street Consultation

We are working hard to improve road safety and air quality outside schools in Sheffield. In doing this we hope to make it easier and safer to walk or cycle to school. Which in turn helps create a more pleasant environment for everyone.

Broomhill Primary School faces ongoing problems with drivers parking dangerously, illegally, and inconsiderately. This puts all pupils’ safety at risk. As you may be aware at several schools across Sheffield, we are implementing School Streets whereby roads are closed to unauthorised traffic at the start and end of the school day. We know that many of you were hoping for a School Street to be implemented at Broomhill Primary School. Unfortunately, School Streets aren’t suitable for all schools, and after carrying out extensive traffic monitoring around the school earlier this year, we are unable to implement a School Street at Broomhill Primary School.

This is due to the following:

• Closing Beech Hill Road at its junction with Newbould Lane would have created a dead-end. This in turn would mean multiple cars turning around at the top of Newbould Lane causing more problems and road safety concerns for children travelling to school.
• Closing Newbould Lane at its junction with Whitam Road was also considered. Traffic counts revealed that this turning is used consistently throughout the day and closing it would be unacceptable as there is no left turn for some distance before or after this turning.
• Therefore, the only way a School Street could have been implemented safely would have been to have multiple closure points each of which would have required marshalling. Due to the size of the school this was something which we felt would not have been sustainable.

However, due to the road safety concerns outside the school it was also felt that doing nothing was also not an option. We have therefore produced the following proposal (see reverse) which we now wish to consult with the school community on. The school will also continue to participate with the Modeshift STARS accreditation scheme which offers road safety training to pupils and helps encourage behaviour change away from car use.

How are we proposing changing the road layout around Broomhill Primary School?

• The last section of Beech Hill Road in front of the school will be made one-way to prevent traffic going past the school from Watson Road. This will reduce incidents of traffic meeting head on outside the school.
• Residents on Beech Hill Road will still be able to leave their driveways in either direction should they wish.
• This proposal should also help improve and significantly reduce the flow of traffic in front of the school.