Answers sought over danger road

An accident last month killed two elderly people

Residents of a Hampshire village are meeting to discuss how to improve an accident blackspot which claimed the lives of another two people last month.

West Wellow residents will discuss the A36, which has been described as one of the most dangerous routes in the county.

On the day the accident happened last month, local MP Sandra Gidley was due to raise the road's safety record in a House of Commons debate.

Wellow Councillor John Lewis says he hopes some concrete proposals will come out of the meeting that he can put forward to government.

We want concrete ideas to come out of the meeting - to focus on two or three things that could be done

Councillor John Lewis

He said: "I've lived in the village for 20 years, and the road has a dreadful history over the last 15.

"The road undulates, it's narrow, and it's not suitable for the kind of traffic it is taking - huge 40-foot trucks heading from Southampton to Bristol and back."

In the latest incident on 3 June, an 84-year-old woman and an elderly man died when a minibus crashed in an eight-vehicle pile-up.

Sandra Gidley MP said at the time: "Clearly there has been a long history of accidents on this road - 71 over the last five years involving injuries of some sort and sadly there has been another one."

Councillor John Lewis said that local people had had enough, and several had already approached him with ideas of how to slow down the traffic passing through the village.

"We want concrete ideas to come out of the meeting - to focus on two or three things that could be done."

The meeting is due to start at 1930 BST on Thursday in Wellow village school.