Neighbours living in a residential road in Reading have called for road safety measures to be taken after a number of crashes were reported.

St Bartholomew's Road runs opposite Palmer Park and provides access to Read College, the Pakistan Community Centre and Palmer Park Library in East Reading.

It is also used by drivers as a key link to get around the town's one-way system to get onto the A4 London Road.

But a number of crashes with neighbours reporting their cars being written off has led them to ask the council to act.

A petition submitted by the Green Party states: "Cars frequently drive too fast on St Bartholomew's Road which has a 20 mph speed limit. It is not uncommon for the cars at the side of the road to be driven into and recently a driver rolled their car over.

"Reading Council please can you tackle speeding on St Bartholomew's Road."

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The petition has received 64 signatures and was presented by Dr Melissa Marselle at the council's traffic management sub-committee.

Dr Marselle said: "The narrowness of the road can make passing very tight, and this poses a danger to road users.

"In October last year, these conditions led to a serious car crash on St Bartholomew's Road which resulted in the car being flipped on its side after it crashed into two parked cars.

"This resulted in two fire engines and an ambulance coming to rescue the person out of their car."

She then stated that a temporary road speed sign was installed for two weeks that was triggered over 114,000 times.

Dr Marselle said: "In light of these concerns, 64 local residents signed a petition requesting the council investigate road safety.

"I urge you to take their concerns seriously."

Agreeing with her, cllr Rob White said: "One resident contacted me to tell me his daughter's car has been written off not once but twice."

He added that Greens successfully campaigned to bring the speed limit down to 20mph in the road and suggested community infrastructure levy funding from developments could be spent on safety measures on the road.

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Cllr Tony Page (Labour, Abbey) said the council only has power to install traffic calming measures such as speed bumps and chicanes.

He said: "I'd venture to guess even if we did put humps in St Bartholomew's there would still be problems."

Cllr Page pointed out that enforcement of speeding is reserved for the police, with some London councils being granted the power to fine people for exceeding speed limits as well.

He said: "We would like to have those powers, we are lobbying for those powers.

"We would like to do more, physical measures can only do so much."

Councillors agreed to add the road to the council's ‘Requests for Traffic
Management Measures’ list so a solution to the issue can be considered.

The petition was presented at a meeting on Thursday, January 12.