Why the 'Walking Bus' plan will not work. Is it just a PR smokescreen to placate locals' concerns over parking & traffic?

The Headteacher of the school has stated that parents will not be using the car park beside the school. This may be her intention, but she cannot make this commitment on behalf of the parents. She cannot enforce this. Some parents will ignore this and as the school grows in size this will inevitably lead to parking problems.  

As we all know, the car park was not adequate when Winbury was in operation with far fewer children. Hibbert Road and Gas Lane are completely unsuitable for roadside parking for the parents. 

The intended "walking bus" or "park & stride scheme" from the Rifle Club/Maidenhead Target Shooting Club car park depends on a lot of parental co-operation and some organisation provided by the school. In bad weather some parents will not be happy for their children to walk from the Rifle Club car park and will want to drop them at the car park near the school. 

This scheme is something that the Head is intending but she cannot force the parents to comply. Even if the scheme appears to work well at the beginning when the school is still very small, it will be much more difficult to enforce once the school grows to full size.

Is this 'walking bus' scheme just a PR smokescreen to placate locals' concerns over the parking & traffic problems, so that they can push through planning permission?

It should also be noted that the road leading to the Rifle Club Car Park is only single track, with no space for traffic passing in both directions. Surely this will end up gridlock with the parents of 210 pupils trying to access it at drop off & pick up times? Have the council considered this? Will they have to build a wider new road, taking up space on the Braywick Sports Fields? (There's a rugby pitch right where they would have to do that so good luck..).

The car park adjacent to the Nature Centre is a public car park and should be available for use by other local residents who walk in the park or visit the Nature Centre. If the school encroaches on this car park it will be reducing the ability of local residents to use a local public amenity, and if they are forced to park on Hibbert Road this would be unsafe.

When construction of the enlarged school begins, presumably all the construction traffic for the work will have to use the public car park. This again is extremely disruptive. It will cause noise and disturbance to neighbouring residents and will also take up space in the public car park.

Remember, when the site was Winbury School there were only at most 90 pupils - Braywick Court School has been 'rubber stamped' to eventually have 210. That's almost 2 and a half times as many children. They intend to take over the existing Nature Centre building, build a large 2 storey development on the site, not in keeping with current architecture, on PUBLIC OPEN SPACE AND build a big brand new building RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF BRAYWICK PARK.

Not cool.


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