Bognor Regis Civic Society © All Rights Reserved. Terms of Use | Privacy Policy

This election happened on the 2nd May, and elected the whole of the membership of West Sussex County Council (WSCC).  The Council is based at County Hall in Chichester and, as its name suggests, covers the whole of West Sussex.  NOTE: This page is historical and there has been another County Council Election since then, in 2020.  We have kept this page here as you will be interested to note that the issues referred to below are STILL current, right now. Is ANYBODY listening?

WSCC has a different set of responsibilities from Arun District Council, these being broadly: highways and transport (except major trunk routes such as the A27 and A24), education, fire and rescue, social care including the elderly and children, libraries  and certain planning matters.  You can find more detail on this on their website at www.westsussex.gov.uk.  WSCC now has another major responsibility, which is to oversee and facilitate all the work necessary by themselves and other agencies to relieve and prevent flooding.

So you will understand from this that if you have a complaint about anything to do with the roads or pavements, or you are concerned about flood risk to your property, your County Councillor is the person you need to see. Similarly, anything to do with your children’s school or care of your elderly relative will be his/her domain, so it is important that you choose the right person when you vote.

THE ISSUES

The major issue for everybody in the Bognor Regis area is Flooding.  There was major flooding in June 2012 which cut off the town for a period and devastated hundreds of homes. The water table remains ominously high, and whenever it rains hard some areas flood again and large bodies of water spread across fields and roads.  WSCC is responsible for prevention of a repeat of this, and so far has done little except produce reports and clear a few ditches.

This not only remains a threat to those whose homes were flooded before, but every house and business occupier in the area has or will suffer increase in insurance premiums and excesses or possibly refused flood cover until the problem is solved.

It is widely accepted that a major contributory factor to this flooding has been the increase in housebuilding to the north of the town, causing faster surface water run-off, overloading the older drainage systems to the south – which were already only barely coping.  It is not accepted that the developers’ ‘balancing ponds’ and ‘sustainable urban drainage systems’ will make any significant difference to this. In fact, in some circumstances these can make the problem worse.

To make matters worse still, there are proposals for further massive housebuilding in the Westergate and Barnham area, also in the Shopwyke and Tangmere areas which will drain surface water towards Bognor Regis.

Because of all this CiViC is calling for an immediate pause in all housebuilding until the flooding problems have been solved to the satisfaction of the insurance industry – meaning that premiums are no longer loaded, excesses return to normal and flood cover is not refused. This must be pursued at County, District and Government levels.

Road damage and congestion is another issue of major concern. Roads in various parts of the area are badly damaged with a great many potholes, broken surfaces, cracks and minor subsidence.  WSCC is working on repairs, but these are progressing slowly and if previous years are any guide the repairs will not be completed before winter weather returns to create further damage.  There must be a greater sense of urgency to all this, otherwise we will continue with a never ending cycle of increasing road damage and failed repairs, bringing a third world ambience to the whole district. In addition, the white and yellow road markings in the town are faded and scruffy, which is inappropriate when regeneration is supposed to be taking place.

Congestion regularly occurs, with slow moving traffic and jams, notably at the A259/A27 junction at Chichester, the Royal Oak (the Pink Pub) at North Bersted and the Hotham Park and Butlins roundabouts.  The Relief Road has made some difference to this, but has made the A259 a lot worse from Flansham to Littlehampton because of increased through traffic from Chichester.  Nothing is being done to solve these problems at present, even though proposals have been made for solutions. In addition, nothing is being done to solve the dangerous junction at Comet Corner in Middleton-on-Sea.

The candidates in 2013 all agreed at a CiViC public meeting to press for the above matters to be dealt with promptly if they are elected and we asked the remainder if they will also commit to this.                                                                                                                                                     Home