School signs up for safety

Efforts by a Barrow school to help improve road safety and pupils' health are being rewarded by Barrow Local Committee of Cumbria County Council. The local committee's vice-chairman, Councillor Kevin Hamilton, is presenting a cheque for £100 to Greengate Junior School. The money will help the school produce a Better Ways To School travel plan. Also, a former pupil of Greengate Junior is being presented with £100 of book tokens by the county council's highways consultants, Capita, for her part in improving road safety. 

Councillor Hamilton said:   

"We are pleased to support the work Greengate Junior School is doing. There are considerable health and social benefits to the Better Ways To School scheme and it gives children a good start in learning about road safety issues and how to cope with getting about on the roads." 

Schemes in the area of Greengate School, costing about £330,000 and funded by the county council, are nearing completion. They are:   

• A new 20mph zone in the Greengate West area, bounded by Greengate Street, Duke Street, Salthouse Road and the railway line. Road humps have been installed to encourage the lower speed limit and flat-topped humps have been put down where pedestrians cross, for example, on School Street and Rawlinson Street near St George's School. 
• Improvement of traffic signals at the junction of Greengate Street and Rawlinson Street. A pedestrian phase has been included so that all pedestrians, particularly schoolchildren and the elderly, can cross safely. 
• Laying of a cycle track on the footway between the leisure centre and Rawlinson Street.     

At the same time the school is working on a travel plan under the Better Ways To School scheme. The school is keen to promote the health benefits of children walking and cycling to and from school and will shortly be arranging cycling training proficiency training for pupils. The 20mph sign for the new speed limit zone is based on a design by a former pupil of Greengate, Stephanie Shaw, made when she was in her last year at the school. Stephanie's idea was picked after pupils rook part in a project to create a design for the sign. The county council's highways consultants, Capita, who have designed and supervised the work on the road safety schemes, are presenting her with £100 worth of book tokens. 

Vice-chairman of the Barrow Local Committee, Councillor Kevin Hamilton, will present the cheque at the school at 3pm on Friday, March 14.