All residents of Shepley and surrounding villages have known for some time just how dangerous the A629 can be.  We have all heard, experienced or shared news of serious accidents and all too often, fatalities.

In May of this year, a young local resident, Ben Cooper, lost his life and two of his friends were seriously injured when their transit van left the road and hit a tree.

This is just one chilling example of the many accidents that have happened either near to or at the Sovereign crossroads.

Yet, apparently, this is a low risk accident zone - that's according to Kirklees Council.

How many deaths and serious injuries will we need before it is reviewed?

In August, another accident led to a car leaving the road and crashing through the wall outside the Cask and Spindle public house. Again, thankfully, no fatalities but injuries and considerable damage to the car and the wall outside the public house.

Another accident

Only a couple of weeks ago, there was another accident at the Sovereign crossroads.

Thankfully, this time injuries were less severe but it did lead to a significant loss to one motorist. The roof of their brand new Range Rove Sport with just a few hundred miles on clock had to be cut off to extract the driver who was complaining of back and neck pains.

One resident, has now written to the Huddersfield Examiner, highlighting the issues being faced and the apparent lack of action from Kirklees Council despite a comprehensive survey outlining steps that needed to be taken to improve this accident blackspot.

His letter is reproduced below

To the Editor, Huddersfield Examiner

Dear Sir,

The so-called ‘traffic management experts’ trying to manage the Sovereign crossroads accident blackspot have been incompetent fools.

And I’ll tell you why.

First, they have not once asked local residents for their opinion about what should be done to reduce the risk of further accidents. Many residents have lived a long time around the area and seen incident after incident unfold. So, you’d think they’d have sensible opinions about what can and should be done?

Instead, the Council, in it’s unquestionable wisdom commissioned a taxpayer-funded consultancy report which concluded: ‘do nothing’. So much for localism and devolved democracy!

Secondly, the Council’s planning department and planning committee should take some blame. They have made the crossroads dangerous with their decision to allow the rebuilding of the service station in its present location. Not only do motorists have to watch three directions of road traffic at the crossroads, but the service station's entrances and exists provide a further two obstacles that offer blind visibility to oncoming traffic. I think a few motor insurance companies and law firms would be interested in MP Jason McCartney’s recent calls for an investigation into Kirklees Council's planning department in this respect.

Thirdly, the speed restrictions within a mile and a half of the Sovereign are confusing. Is it 50, 40 or 30 mph? You choose! The signage is dreadful. Again, I blame council and highway planners for introducing multiple speed restrictions and erecting too many road signs which are not consistent with the road conditions.

Not helped, of course by the non-essential signs directing motorists to the lovely new housing estates in the area.

At a crossroads known to be dangerous? How stupid can you get!

Fourthly, some of the fancy new electronic signs don’t even work when they’re supposed to. Come up the hill from Shepley and the first sign just around the bend will light up with a speed warning when it feels like it. It’s got a mind of its own.

I remember the day council officials came to erect crash barriers on the hill towards Birdsedge only to take them down 2 days later because they obstructed the view of motorists exiting from Denby Dale road.

To residents it’s common-sense that seeking local opinion is the key to finding a sensible solution to this accident blackspot - not a high-brow consultancy report that says sweet all.

But then I’ve seen too many so-called expert careers destroyed in the courtroom to be convinced that some of our esteem traffic management experts indeed know what they do.

Yours faithfully

Will Roebuck