Just hours after the long awaited resurfacing work began on Camelot Street this morning, contractors called a halt and went home – citing dangerous behaviour and abuse from some motorists.
This bizarre turn of events follows the widely welcomed decision by Nottinghamshire County Council in July to finally proceed with a complete overhaul of the badly potholed stretch of road which had been put on hold until after the building of the Lace Gardens development was complete. As we’ve previously reported, preparatory work began at the start of September. Shortly afterwards, all affected properties received a letter advising them of the likely disruption beginning at 8am today (Saturday 26th September) and set to continue until next Wednesday – reinforced by advance warning signs such as those below.
Clearly many estate residents did already know about the work starting today, since they had moved their vehicles. Wayne Swift Tweeted: “What a nightmare! If you’re going to park on Old Station Drive please do not park on the green – and please respect the parking spaces of residents and do not park across their drives. We’ve already got a trailer parked on the bad bend making matters worse.”
Despite the extensive prior notification of the Camelot Street resurfacing – with warnings there could be daytime delays of up to fifteen minutes to allow the work to progress safely – it seems some villagers were still either unaware or unhappy with the arrangements. A number of drivers were reportedly not willing to wait or listen to the workmen and continued to drive down the street.
Shaun Faulkner of Tarmac Highway Services, which is carrying out the work, confirms: “The scheme has now been suspended due to the lack of cooperation and abusive comments from the residents on the estate. So on safety grounds we had no choice but to pull off site.”
However, one householder reported that, as soon as the road was first closed at around 8am today (see top photo), site workers were already telling people they wouldn’t get in or out – whereas the ‘hard closure’ wasn’t supposed to happen until 5pm. This has led to complaints of a lack of local knowledge and miscommunication.
Resident Kelly Mitchell reveals: “My husband says (workers) told him to drive out ‘the other way’! Apparently there’s another way to drive out that brings you out opposite Ruddington Grange. When he assured them that there isn’t, they told him they’d let him out that once – but he would have to drive back in the ‘other way’. You couldn’t make it up!”
Andrew Shelley comments: “It’s unbelievable they have packed up and left! This just means even more disruption ahead. 27 residents on our community group are all astounded at the decision. There was absolutely no danger to anyone. All they needed to do was enforce the closure and explain why.”
Zoe Clark adds: “I don’t know what they expected with how many houses they are blocking off on a Saturday daytime. If they’d have just put it as a full closure people would have made other plans. But it didn’t say that!”
As can be seen from the latest photographs above, taken after today’s work was suspended, most of the main road surface has already been removed, leaving Camelot Street in an even worse state than it was before! Resident Jerome Lucey, who kindly supplied us with these pictures, says: “I imagine someone who drove up the road and stopped the work will be the first to complain when they get a puncture!”
And Suzy Underwood comments: “Why can’t people just do as they are told?! One bloody weekend! We’ve been waiting for this for so long. We’ve known this was coming. I moved my car.”
Shaun Faulkner of Tarmac promises: “I will be meeting with VIAEM on site on Monday to try and resolve this.”
UPDATE 29th SEP 2020:
Following yesterday’s meeting, VIAEM has announced these works have been rescheduled to restart on Monday October 12th. The details are >>HERE<<.
