Roger Oakley, councillor for Selden ward, has joined the "vulnerable" residents in Dawes Close in their call for parking restrictions to stop people blocking the route to their homes.

Conservative Mr Oakley says the access to the group of eight homes at the end of the close is a narrow road, which is "continually blocked by inconsiderate motorists".

Residents believe the cars left there include local workers, who park there all day because the road is one of only a few in the area without any parking restrictions.

Blocked access

Mr Oakley said: "I am very worried we're going to have an incident one day where someone will be unnecessarily injured or even die as a result of the inability of the emergency services to respond."

Residents are equally concerned. Kathleen Winton, 68, who has lived in the close for 41 years, said: "This has been going on for 10 years.

"We were missed out when the consultation into parking restrictions was held and by the time we replied, it was too late.

"We have one resident who has nurses and carers three to four times a day and they have to park round the corner.

"And we have had two occasions when ambulances have had to park some distance away."

Pavement parking

Victor Elliott, 79, says his carers cannot get close to his home and his daughters, who have big cars, have to park streets away when they visit.

He added: "All it would take is a two-hour parking notice. Then the carers could park for two hours and the all-day parkers would have to go somewhere else."

Rita Winton, 73, said many cars also parked on the pavements, which meant she had to push a wheelchair-bound friend in the road.

She added: "God forbid we need a fire engine here."

Aware of issue

A spokesman for West Sussex County Council said: "We are well aware of parking issues in Dawes Close and the surrounding roads.

"We have carried out a preliminary consultation on parking issues in Worthing, which indicated there is support for parking controls in these roads to resolve access problems caused by indiscriminate parking and parking by non-residents.

"We are reviewing the Worthing Controlled Parking Zone, and this area will be incorporated within the proposals that come forward."

The county council could not give a timescale of when any proposals would be put in place.


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