Bromley Council are proposing a school street on the unmade part of Westgate Rd for St Mary’s primary. During school drop off and pick up the road will be closed other than for residents. Fine our more here:
Residents must complete the short survey by 30 Jan 2022.
Copers Cope Area Residents' Association (CCARA) & West Beckenham Residents' Association (WBRA) 
It is not a School Street. Roads and Westgate Road are for all. This would be obstructing a public right of passage.
This right is for everyone. It includes postal vans, delivery drivers bringing the courier online goods we so much rely on for convenience and Covid restrictions, people visiting Beckenham Place Park or maintaining it, plumbers, electricians, etc visiting homes; relatives, home helps, social services, health care and GP home visits. All would be prevented under the proposals, or fined by number plate recognition if made permanent, as happens unpopularity with other borough schemes which are a new stealth tax on the unwary.
The road called Beckenham Place Park is also unmade and residential. Blocking one end here just increases road miles, fuel use, emissions, road damage etc in sending divers the long way round and via the dangerous 5-way junction at Southend Rd, Foxgrove Rd, Park Rd, BPP road.
This is currently unmade road with a pleasant countryside character. Putting up barriers and high visibility signs would be creating urbanised physical and visual street clutter spoiling the road which is part of the character of the area and approach to Beckenham Place Park.
As a backwater unmade road, any vehicle drop offs to the school are in immediate proximity to the school and in a very wide road. Preventing access will only move parking and movements from a road where it causes few problems, to the busy Foxgrove and Westgate roads which also have parking demand. This would be moving drop off parking to a worse place.
Parents or guardians may have busy lives, jobs, live at distance or have more than one school to visit. This is just demonising parents and mostly mothers. Are there other proposals to ostracise other road user groups?
This does not ban car journeys, just move people from a side road to a busy main road.
There have been other schemes to ENCOURAGE alternative school trips eg. The ‘walking bus’ or cycle training. These do not include blocking the way to road users.
A council report says other trials have had mixed success and side effects as outlined above, is just moving congestion.
Pleas do not implement this proposal.
Council scheme to stop parking in Westgate Road will create dangerous congestion and pollution in Foxgrove Road and surrounding streets. It will impact on local Conservation Area. Borough needs to address congestion caused by shutting Westgate Bridge one way now causing long delays at Shortlands/Beckenham High Street at peak times.
Whilst the planned School Street may benefit the immediate area outside the school, it will inevitably force more vehicles into surrounding roads. We already endure a twice daily influx, including some selfish and inconsiderate parents who obstruct driveways: a School Street can only exacerbate the problem.