ROAD safety campaigners have claimed promises of a new crossing in Skelmanthorpe have been broken.

Members of Skelmanthorpe Community Action Group (SCAG) say they were promised a new crossing on the main Commercial Road more than two years ago.

The group says the crossing is vital to protect children travelling to four nearby schools, a nursery and to Shelley College about a mile away.

Action group spokesman Christopher Ward said Kirklees Council had only caved into their crossing demands after demonstrations by parents and children and pressure from local councillors.

But he added that the crossing had never been put in place.

And he said he had been told the lengthy wait had been caused because a bus stop was blocking the most suitable site.

Metro had refused to move it, he claimed.

“Children attending Skelmanthorpe’s infant and junior schools are faced with one of the most dangerous road crossings in the whole Kirklees area,” he said.

“The combination of rush hour traffic negotiating a narrow section of Commercial Road, very narrow pavements and the absence of both a crossing and any kind of school crossing patrol, creates a very high risk situation for all concerned.

“Two years on and nothing has happened, despite repeated inquiries about when the crossing will be built.

“Parents are very unhappy with this lack of action.

“They fear that a child will have to die before the council takes its responsibilities seriously.

“The complacency of the Highways department is simply staggering.

“Children’s lives are at risk here,” added the SCAG spokesman.

“Schoolchildren in the other local villages are protected.

“Scissett, for example, has a crossing controlled by traffic lights as well as speed cameras to control traffic speeds.

“We have nothing.

“It would seem that Skelmanthorpe’s children don’t matter as far as the local authority is concerned.

“If this were a school in the middle of Huddersfield action would have been taken at once.

“Sadly the villages on the fringes of the Kirklees empire get a raw deal.

“We have to fight for even the smallest things and it takes forever to get anything done,” Mr Ward added.

A spokeswoman for Kirklees Council said the authority was still intending to build the crossing.

She said: “Investigations have been carried out but an appropriate site hasn’t yet been found.

“The search for a suitable site will continue.”