What you said: readers respond

Jan 20 2011 Buckinghamshire Examiner

HERE are a selection of the comments we have received since breaking the news last week that Bucks County Council plans to turn off yet more street lights across the county.

Christine Hearne said: "Bucks County Council are a bunch of bone idle, overpaid pen-pushers.

"They want Joe Public to do their job for them. We are to report where the potholes are; volunteer to grit our roads; and now they will have us wearing miner's lamps because of no street lighting.

"Have they gone completely mad or are they just stupid? What are they doing with our council tax money?

"Suggestions ... each parish should have a grit lorry that converts to snow plough. That lorry is then responsible for its local parish.

"Accident prone roads should have their street lights left on. How many more have got to die on the A413?

"It's a joke the council saying it is enabling us to have a better quality of life by switching off the lights. What about the carbon emissions from the rubbish that is only collected once a fortnight!

"Thank God our climate isn't like Greece or Spain.

(I'd rather live there because their waste is collected daily.)

"It's all very well saying they have to make cuts. Well, Mr CEO, you take a pay cut and get your priorities right and then maybe you will have the support of your voters.

"At the moment you have a lot to answer for and three deaths on your hands."

Judith Graver said: "When the street lights were initially switched off without prior warning, I wrote a letter of complaint to BCC which, of course, was ignored.

"I live in a small cul de sac off the A413 in between Chalfont St Peter and Chalfont St Giles.

"When driving home at night it is impossible to see my turning until the last minute due to the glare of the headlights of the oncoming traffic and in bad road conditions such as rain, this situation is made even worse.

"Switching my headlights to full beam only angers and dazzles oncoming drivers.

"In addition, my 15-year-old son has to walk home at 5.30pm from the school bus stop in Chalfont St Giles, a distance of about one mile, along a dark, tree-lined pavement as I'm sure do other children. This is not acceptable.

"With the volume of cars on the road these days, it is not viable or safe to have completely dark roads lit only by car headlights.

"One is constantly dazzled by the continuous stream of oncoming traffic, you can't even see the cats' eyes in the road for guidance and find yourself following the glare of the headlights instead which is extremely dangerous.

"The only roads suitable to be unlit are minor country roads without much traffic where you can use your headlights safely to see where you're going.

"At the very least I would expect to see street lighting until 10.30pm when the volume of traffic has reduced, the school children are safely at home and most people have returned from work.

"Finally, I was disgusted to read that apparently the switch-off has been done in the name of the environment.

"This is simply not the case. BCC must have been rubbing their hands in glee at the oppurtunity of the extra money that the switch-off gave them otherwise why didn't we all see a reduction in our council tax bills commensurate with the cost savings of unlit roads?"