Unlawful use of roads in Thurrock for car racing and noise issues

Dear Residents

You will be pleased to know that this will soon be a thing of the past.

The Council and the Highways Agency are planning to put bollards to prevent u-turns at the A126. Included to this, they gave me the following update:

Unlawful use of roads in Thurrock for car racing and noise issues

A multi-agency group has been set up to look at methods of tackling the issue from this group action as set out below has been taken or investigated as to practicality of implementation.

• Essex police regularly target the area with special operations.
  
• police have seized vehicles under driving legislation and Road Traffic legislation relating to insurance
  orders for the Lakeside and Oliver road areas have been introduced on three occasions;
  
• police takes photos of the cruisers cars and sends them with a letter to insurance companies
  
• of speed cameras on the A126 and Oliver Road has been looked into but the accident statistics for both roads are insufficient to justify the placing of such cameras on safety grounds.
  
• The placing of overt CCTV cameras on the A126 was considered but found impractical.
  
• A camera was placed on Oliver road but failed to capture any evidential quality footage that could be used.
  
• new 50 Mph speed limit on the A126 has been considered, however this is unlikely to affect those who are causing the noise issues through racing, as in many cases the speed limit is already exceeded.
  
•  calming measures have been implemented on West Thurrock Way, and will shortly be fitted in Oliver Road. This option is not available for the A126 because its status as an A road dual carriageway.
  
• The piloting of temporary alterations to the dumbbell roundabout over the A13 used as part of the circuit for racers on the A126 is hopefully to be shortly implemented by the Highways agency.
  
• Warning signs have been displayed on access points to the A126
  
• Blue tooth transmission technology has been used on a regular basis at the sites of Cruises to send messages to mobile phones in the area targeting those involved with a warning message re driver behaviour.
  
• Essex Police have been working to target the organisers of such gatherings to make them legally responsible for the gatherings.
  
• Specially organised Cruiser meetings have been organised at Arena Essex with access to the track for the cruisers vehicles.
  
• A meeting with a large number of the cruisers was organised by Essex police and held in Kent to try and get agreement on control of the behaviour through self policing.
  
• Essex Police have also been working with the cruiser press and web sites to deter the use of various locations including Thurrock in Essex