VILLAGERS have branded the latest traffic calming scheme in Liphook as a total waste of money.
They have slammed the "pinch-points" on the approach roads to the Square as ineffectual and dangerous.
The villagers are complaining about five sets of gateway pinchpoints which are being placed close to the village centre on the Longmoor, Headley, London, Midhurst, Haslemere and Portsmouth Roads which will indicate the start of the new 20 mph zone being tried out by Hampshire County Council.
The 20mph scheme is part of bigger county-council package of traffic calming measures being carried out in Liphook at a total cost of £65,000. Part of it is being funded by developers contributions from Sainsbury's, there is a contribution from Bramshott and Liphook Parish Council and the remainder is Hampshire County Council money.
But this week villagers said they would rather see the money spent on more worthwhile and high-priority highways measures.
Jo Elliott was one of many residents who took time at the weekend, to examine all the pinch-points so far in place.
"They are a total waste of time and money," said Mrs Elliott this week, "pinch points don't work. They are not stopping the traffic, they are just throwing the cars closer together and they are hurtling through the pinchpoints closer together at the same speed as before."
She said she would prefer to see taxpayers' money spent on making it safer for people to walk.
"I want to see more people walking and fewer taking to their cars all the time. If the county council spent money widening the pavements it would make it safer for pedestrians and provide a pinching effect anyway for cars."
Villager Russell Ellis, who has been a long-standing critic of traffic measures taken in Liphook in the past, told The Herald: "They are restricting traffic in Liphook to such as extent that vehicles cannot get about and this is causing problems, wherever there is a pinch-point there is a hold-up and hold-ups always cause problems."
He said residents of Longmoor Road warned that pinch-points were not the answer several years ago when a similar traffic calming scheme was introduced around Bohunt School.
"We raised a petition with 600 signatures on it in protest at the pinchpoints," said Mr Ellis. "Despite that, the work went ahead and we have since been proved right. The Longmoor Road is no different from how it was before the work. Pinch-points are a waste of money and they do not achieve their aim."
He claimed they were actually dangerous and a woman had already been knocked off her bicycle in the existing Longmoor Road pinch-points when she cycled through at the same time as a coach.
The pinch-points in the Haslemere Road opposite the Chiltley Manor turning were ill-thought out, said Mr Ellis, because they posed a danger to traffic turning out of Chiltley Manor towards Liphook where the road narrowed as Haslemere Road became Queen Street.
In the Midhurst Road new pinch-points had been built just after an existing speed hump.
He said traffic calming points in the Portsmouth Road had to be removed as soon as they were installed because they were in the wrong place, which put the cost up even higher.
"The county council makes a hotch- potch of everything it does in Liphook and it's our money down the drain."
Sub Officer Mick Weeks, who is in charge of Liphook fire station, told The Herald taht he believed the new measures would make it even more difficult to answer fire calls quickly.
"They will make it even more difficult to get the fire engine through the Square when the traffic is at its worst."
He added: "This has been done at someone's whim, it's a total waste of money and I can't honestly see what purpose the pinch-points will serve."
John Tough, the chairman of Bramshott and Liphook Parish Council's highways, byways and transport committee said: "This is part of the county council's 20 mph pilot zone in the centre of Liphook.
"We did not ask for it, but we welcomed it when it was offered. I think it will be of great benefit to the centre of the village. Pinch-points are an appropriate traffic management measure to reduce speeds down to 20 mph.
County councillor Michael Cartwright said: "As far as I am aware all the measures have been implemented as a result of public pressure and it certainly appears that in general, the public wishes us to take action to slow traffic down in Liphook."
He added that many people had complained because it had taken the county council so long to implement the measures : "This has been because we wanted to carry out work on several traffic calming measures at the same time."