People on Waverley estate demand safety improvements after van ploughs into house
It's the 6th crash residents have seen on the same road since November
Last updated 20th Jul 2023
People living in Waverley are demanding action after seeing six car crashes on the same junction since November.
They’re raising concerns about the safety of the road, which doesn’t have markings or speed limit signs because it still hasn’t been officially ‘adopted’ by Rotherham Council.
The most recent crash saw a van plough into the living room of Rebecca Crofts’ house on Monday night (17th July).
“We’d just put the children to bed when we heard a massive explosion," she says.
“When that first happened here it was the sound of something really quite terrifying, but this is the fourth or fifth time that this is happened so we knew straight away there’d been a collision.
“But what alarmed us was the front of the house started to fill up with smoke so we thought there’d been an explosion. We got the children out of their beds and evacuated out of the back of the house. Then we realised the vehicle had gone into our home.”
The van smashed into the bay window of the room usually used by Rebecca’s two children. Due to the damage done to one of the main beams, the family are currently unsure whether the house is structurally safe so they’re not using one side of their home.
Rebecca explains that the road running through the Waverley Estate has essentially become a through-road linking the nearby areas of Catcliffe, Treeton and Handsworth.
Another resident, Vinay Mivarda, has lived in Waverley for six years and says people often speed on the road. He's seen six crashes outside his home since November.
“Each crash gets more serious. The last three were really, really nasty.
“It’s very dangerous given the walkway next to my house is a common route for all the kids going to school in the morning.
“The crash that happened before this last one was like 15 minutes after the school-run. Had it happened during the school-run there would’ve been many kids who got injured because the car ended up on the walkway.”
In order for roads to be maintained by a local authority, they have to be officially ‘adopted’ – but Rotherham Councillor Firas Miro told us the Waverley Estate hasn’t been adopted yet because of an issue with a sewer which needs to be repaired by the developer Harworth.
He says the current time estimate on that is November 2024.
In an official statement, Rotherham Council’s Strategic Director for Regeneration and Environment, Paul Woodcock, said: “We are saddened to hear about the accidents that have taken place at Waverley. The road in question is in fact not a council owned highway and is instead managed by the developer of the estate.
“We are now in talks with the developer for this road to be formally adopted by the council so we can then put relevant markings in place, to enable better safety in this area.”
The developer Harworth told us: “Harworth is aware of a road traffic incident that is understood to have taken place on Highfield Lane, within our Waverley development in Rotherham, on Monday 17th July 2023. Our thoughts are with everyone who has been impacted by this incident and we will of course cooperate with all relevant authorities as they investigate.
“We acknowledge the concerns that residents have previously raised with us regarding Highfield Lane, and reports of other incidents on the road. Highfield Lane has been constructed as per the approved designs for Waverley and associated legal requirements of the council. Notwithstanding this, and in light of these concerns, Harworth has commissioned a specialist assessment of all junctions along the road to assess traffic activity including flow and speed. The findings of this assessment are expected shortly and will be presented to the council for review, with a view to implementing any recommendations to improve safety.”
A spokesperson from another developer involved in the Waverley Estate, Barratt Developments Yorkshire West, said: “All of the roads built by Barratt at the development were built in accordance with standards agreed by the Council, including the markings”.