Double yellow lines branded illegal and dangerous are to be removed.

Hart District Council ordered the markings and white hatching inside to be painted on Velmead Road, Fleet, as part of a package of road safety improvements. But it has vowed to move them following pressure from Peter Ashford, who has long been campaigning against illegal road markings in Fleet town centre.

The ruling comes after a site visit to see the controversial markings by John Foggo, Hart District Council’s highways team manager, Stephen Parker, the council’s cabinet member for parking, and James Bailey, a representative from the Stilwell Partnership, which designed and carried out the work.

Mr Foggo said the trio arrived before parents began dropping off their children at the nearby Fleet infants and Velmead junior schools.

They waited for about 45 minutes to see how the restrictions and the hatching build-out affected drivers and parents parking at the schools.

Mr Foggo said it was clear that the markings had the effect of keeping the area clear, thus achieving the objective of creating a passing place. But he said that every car that drove through when no other cars were parked drove straight over the ‘build-out’.

Mr Foggo said that following the site meeting he met with Nick Stilwell of The Stilwell Partneship, who defended the scheme.

Mr Stilwell said: “The experimental scheme has been successful and has achieved the objective of creating a self-enforcing passing bay at a low cost. Debating the legality of the markings will only waste further public funds on a low cost scheme where we are satisfied that the principle objective works.”

Mr Stilwell said his company now proposed to reposition the double yellow lines adjacent to the kerb line and remove the temporary hatching.

He added: “We will continue to monitor the situation and if the yellow lines are continually abused we will recommend that a physical build-out will be installed when funds are available. I’m sure you will agree that the above course of action is the most effective.”

Mr Foggo said that as a result of the meeting he had arranged to have the lines altered.

Hart chief executive Geoff Bonner said he interpreted the comments made by Mr Foggo and Mr Stilwell to mean that Mr Ashford was right all along to criticise the markings.

In an email to Mr Ashford, Mr Bonner added: “I am intending to meet with the council’s staff who handle this work to try and avoid similar issues arising in future. Thank you for persisting in this matter.”

Mr Ashford thanked Mr Bonner for the information.

He added: “It is good that these illegal road markings will now be removed.”

However, Mr Ashford was scathing of The Stilwell Partn-ership in its role in the debacle.

He told Mr Bonner: “Your contractor should wake up to the fact that neither the white hatched marking nor the yellow lines are compliant with prescribed traffic signs and neither is the bizarre combin-ation of them, that being the reason why they are to be removed.

“I understand that there must have been a traffic mana-gement problem as a reason for it but it remains that solving a nuisance by creating a fore-seeable hazard is irrational.

“Although the majority of drivers will have passed over the road markings it is the one who does not on a wintry day that will be involved in an accident.”

Mr Ashford said installing a build-out on the blind bend would be ‘nothing short of lunacy’. “Such a development could end with an inquest followed by the familiar learning of lessons,” he added. “Does Fleet really need another long-running saga like the mercifully abandoned fiasco in Elvetham Road?

“If there actually is an authorised yellow-line restriction at this location it simply needs to be enforced with a parking attendant usefully occupied in issuing penalty charge notices to mindless offenders.”

Cllr Parker said the new plan was to remove the white hatchings and paint the double yellow lines along the edge of the road. He added: “If it turns out that people don’t respect the double yellow lines then build-outs could be an idea.”