Residents come out for – and against – new Mexborough bus route

The route now follows Harlington Road and Plumpton Avenue instead, which the transport company says helps serve more people and avoid problems with parked cars on Morton Road.

After last week’s Weekender coverage of objectors’ fears about safety on the new route, Harlington Road resident Catherine Benfold said: “There are two sides to every story.

“This petition and protest is more to do with stopping buses passing their property than it is with safety.

“The only thing making the road dangerous now is the illegally parked cars on the junction and the protesters parking their vehicles on the road now instead of on their drives.

“They have no consideration for the elderly, disabled and people without transport. The people who are unable to walk round the estate and protest.

“They should not be allowed to dictate where public transport buses run. I live on Harlington Road and have no objection whatsoever.”

Objector Peter Cowdell, of Plumpton Avenue, insisted that the protests against the new route were about safety.

He said: “Someone will get injured, disabled or killed.There have been no answers about the size of buses, the weight, stopping distances.

“They say Morton Road is not wide enough but we’re told it’s only three inches less than in the middle of Plumpton, but the hill is two feet narrower.

“The hill is unfit for buses. It’s very steep with two bends. When you’re at the bottom you can’t see what’s coming down Plumpton Avenue.

“Imagine a boy racer on quad bikes, bikes, no helmets. We see this and hear it too often.”

Meanwhile, Mexborough councillor Sean Gibbons has asked South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority to clarify its comment to him that no consultation was done, following Stagecoach’s assertion in last week’s paper that it had been carried out.

Rumours that the switch had been because of a size difference with the new fleet of electric buses were also untrue, the transport company has said.