DOUBLE yellow lines are not the answer to parking issues near St John’s Primary School in Priory, Wellington, according to town councillor John Thorne.

Yellow lines have been proposed on either side of the bend at the bottom of the road running past the school, where parents often park to drop off and collect their children.

It was a response to a recent incident reported in the WWN, in which a 44-tonne articulated lorry became stuck when trying to negotiate between cars parked close to the bend.

But Cllr Thorne, who is also a Somerset County Council candidate for the area at next May’s elections, said he had little sympathy for lorries using the residential road.

Cllr Thorne said his solution to the issue was for businesses to use smaller delivery vehicles.

He said: “County highways officials came to look at the situation and we saw a large lorry negotiating the bend while we were there and it was clearly not an easy manoeuvre even when there were not many cars.

“So their proposal, which has now been supported by the town council, was to put down double yellow lines to keep the bend clear for lorries.

“These lorries are servicing Waitrose and businesses on the Blackdown Business Park behind the supermarket, and when I suggested the answer was instead for firms to use smaller lorries, I was laughed at. My argument is that Priory and Sylvan Road and the surrounding routes are residential streets, and businesses should use appropriate size vehicles.

“Tesco and Sainsbury’s do not use 44-tonne lorries to deliver internet shopping to people’s doorsteps, because if they did, of course, they would not be able to get through a lot of residential streets.”

Cllr Thorne said he was told there were no powers available to the county council to force businesses to use smaller delivery lorries. But he said direct powers were not necessary, because if large lorries were unable to make deliveries, then market forces would see businesses naturally move to using smaller vehicles to survive.

Cllr Thorne said: “I know there are issues for local residents with cars being parked across people’s driveways at the start and end of school hours, which I believe also happens at some other schools, but these can be dealt with by the police and/or by parents being more thoughtful.”