As you may know, in January our Council voted to accept the proposals for the new school on the Myers Grove site. It has therefore put a closure notice

on both schools. The result will be that in 2011 Wisewood School will close, and all of its students will have to travel through Malin Bridge from Hillsborough

to Lower Stannington.

The diagrams on our April newsletter were created using the data from the Council’s Traffic Impact Assessment. The assessment predicted how much traffic would be trying to drive on our roads, but failed to model what

would happen as a result. The assessment recommended that the traffic modelling should be done very soon. However, the Council have no plans to

do it. They have also ruled out subsidised school buses.

We do know that the Council accepts that Malin Bridge, Stannington Road and Holme Lane are already at capacity at peak times.

The Traffic Assessment data shows that by 2011 with the new school in place;

* traffic at Malin Bridge goes up by almost a third,

* traffic into Malin Bridge from Hillsborough goes up by about 75%,

* traffic up Stannington Road doubles.

We predict that the extra traffic trying to get up Stannington Road will be jammed as it tries to turn right onto Wood Lane across the oncoming traffic

moving down the hill. This jam will back up into Malin Bridge and cause the gyratory system (already overloaded) to jam up as well. Effects will be felt

down Holme Lane to Hillsborough Corner.

Traffic trying to get out of Hillsborough and the Loxley Valley will divert and block up other residential streets leading onto Holme Lane or elsewhere. Air

pollution levels and stress levels will rocket.