Out & About... Scoot-ing- along?

High Street traffic...

Councillors Farrer & Churchill were out and about in St Neots Hight Street recently meeting with members of the Cambridgeshire Highways Agency and holding discussions on the implementation of the new SCOOT traffic system.

Bob explains: "SCOOT - Is a traffic management system which has been installed through St Neots High Street to manage and improve the flow of traffic through this busy thoroughfare. It's similar to that which has been installed in Huntingdon on certain locations around the ring road."

At a cost of Four hundred and Sixty thousand pounds, this is not a cheap solution to the problem of traffic flow through our town. The money has been provided through local developers contributions which is deliberately set aside to cover this type of improvement.

Ken continues: "Bob and I have been working with Cambridgeshire Highways for the last twelve months to address the situation we have in St Neots. The problem is twofold. We have high levels of traffic building up through the High Street owing to the number of traffic lights and as a result of vehicles being stalled together with the height of the buildings at certain key points, we have high levels of air pollution."

The system works on a broadband signal effectively relaying information from point to point and back to a central hosting point. Due to the complexity of the works it has taken longer to install than was originally desired owing in part to the County Council switching its broadband provider.

Bob explained further: "It's a fully interactive system which I understand can allow traffic to be held up at the far end's of the High Street to allow for a smoother flow of traffic and alleviate some of the holdups we have at peak times in the High Street."

Prior to Christmas traffic was severely affected by the installation of cables.

Bob continues his point: "It was very unfortunate about the difficulties which were caused. There didn't seem to be much understanding of the complexities of installing such a high tech system alongside the existing system, it has delayed the new system being in full operational order."

We anticipate the system will be fully operational shortly and have agrees with Cambridgeshire Highways that regular updates on the effectiveness of the system will be supplied to us.


All images and text © cg-photography
Promoted by Carol Gamby on behalf of Ken Churchill and Bob Farrer all of 83 Huntingdon Street, St Neots, Cambridgeshire, PE19 1DU