PLANS for a pedestrian crossing in Rosemary Lane are under way after the county and town councils came to an agreement.

Blockades had been thrown up for the crossing at the top of Rosemary Lane where it joins Starr Lane because of a land dispute.

The land adjacent to the proposed crossing is common land, meaning Essex County Council would have to purchase it before any work could start – a process that could take “considerable time,” and have cost implications.

Town councillor Wendy Barron, who sits on the traffic management committee, told the Broadcast that �discussions about the location of a crossing in Rosemary Lane have been going on for three or four years.

“They came about because of the additional housing at Woodlands Park, meaning that more people were walking down into the town, and also the primary school had closed and the lollipop person had to go,” she said.

In a letter to Dunmow’s town clerk, ECC’s development management engineer Liz Chapman said it would not buy the land but plans would still go ahead.

“It has been decided that the county council are prepared to accept a substandard crossing in terms of design,” she said.

“The only reason it is sub-standard is that a standard crossing should have three lines of tactiles within the footway once you have crossed the carriageway – but due to the boundary line we can only fit in two.”

Mrs Chapman stressed that this kind of crossing was not a safety problem and the county council was happy to issue an exception report allowing for the construction of the crossing.

However, the lack of land meant ECC will not be able to widen the footpaths. The town council had raised the issue because of the volume of traffic on Rosemary Lane.

A deadline of next March has been proposed.