Barnham Road set to close for connection works next week despite Parish Council objections

If current estimates hold true, the road will be closed from Monday until February 16 while connection works take place.

In order to protect the public and the work force, the public notice says, the closure will be in place 24 hours a day. Access will be maintained for emergency services, residents and pedestrians and alternative routes will be signposted on site.

The works are set to go ahead despite objections from Barnham and Eastergate Parish Council, which called for a delay as soon as the public notice was filed, citing the level of disruption experienced by motorists and residents in the weeks and months after last year’s sewage pipe collapse, which left Barnham Road entirely inaccessible for some time.

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West Sussex County Council responded to make clear that the application for the works predates the sewage pipe collapse and the works that followed: “At the time the idea of the connection works being undertaken at the same time as the Southern Water repair works was looked at. However for technical reasons this was not possible and we accepted that a separate closure would be required,” a county council spokesperson has said.

Acknowledging the inconvenience to local road users, the spokesperson said the county council is unable to defer the works any further, since doing so might be seen as ‘stifling development’, leading developers Elivia Homes Boweries and Warwick Developments to potentially pursue legal action against the council.

Nor is it possible, according to the County Council, to conduct the works under two-way lights, or to close the road for less than 48 hours, due to the depth of the works themselves and the full extent of the actual works.

"We hope that the works will not take the full five days of the notice period, but we need to be realistic about the risks that any operator takes when working in the ground.”

The news comes amidst continued controversy among Barnham residents, who say the fallout from last year’s sewer pipe collapse continues to effect businesses and livelihoods.

At a public meeting late last month, residents quizzed area MP Andrew Griffith and representatives from local authorities on the state of sewage, developments and road works in the area. According to Barnham resident Johnathan Wright, the mood was one of disenfranchised frustration:

“They made it very obvious that firstly the system is not fit for purpose and secondly residents have no power to hold these institutions to account, which was for me the most worrying aspect of the matter,” he told Sussex World.

Adding that he and other residents have “lost faith” in local authorities, he said: "It's just awful for residents, absolutely terrible, and they're not co-ordinating things properly. They're just closing the roads all at the same time.

The overall impression is that we're just powerless to do anything about these problems.”