FOR the past three months, drivers trying to leave Reading have been caught up in delays while a railway bridge was repainted. But instead of motoring nirvana when the works ended, a new nightmare is causing tailbacks.
But Reading Borough Council is promising this is only going to be a temporary jam, while they finish the installation.
Last July, traffic lights at the junction of Cholmeley Road in Newtown and the A4 London Road were taken out after a motorist crashed into them.
Reading Borough Council had to source a whole new set of lights as the ones that were damaged were of an older technology, no longer in use.
While they were waiting, temporary lights were installed and caused much frustration as they failed frequently, making it dangerous for pedestrians trying to cross London Road to get to a bus stop, as well as vehicles trying to come out of Cholmeley Road.
And residents were so concerned at the length of time the works were taking they started to consider holding a birthday party for the first anniversary of the temporary installation.
Last month the replacements were finally switched on for the first time, and instantly caused delays with traffic filling up Kings Road at all hours of the day.
The phasing of the lights has been set so instead of being traffic along London Road followed by traffic turning right out of Cholmeley Road, there are now three phases as traffic going into Reading has been separated from traffic heading out of town.
Green party leader Rob White is ward member for Park as well as leader of the opposition, where the lights are situated. He said he has received many messages from residents frustrated by the new technology, and called on the council to take immediate action.
“It is great to see that the Cholmeley Road traffic lights have gone live nearly one year after they were damaged, however it is disappointing that the phasing on them is not right,” he said.
“They are only letting one direction of London Road go at a time rather than both directions at the same time. This is causing frustration, further tailbacks and pollution on London Road.
“The council should fix this as soon as possible.”
A spokesperson for Reading Borough Council said things will settle down soon.
“The new traffic signals are currently working in a similar way to the temporary traffic signals they replaced while the engineering team conduct the final testing, setup and calibration of the new vehicle detection system,” they told Reading Today.
“During testing it has been discovered that some revisions are required to the controller programming, and engineers will shortly install the revised setup.
“When this has been completed the junction will revert to operating in a similar way to the original junction, allowing east and westbound traffic to flow concurrently.”
