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PEOPLE living next to Queen Elizabeth's School near Wimborne have reacted with fury to the felling of a silver birch tree outside the school.

Contractors working at the site for Dorset County Council cut down the tree to make room for a traffic light junction to a new access road to the school and leisure centre.

Plans for the junction have long been opposed by residents of the nearby Broads housing estate, who say increased traffic will lower their quality of life.

Now the felling of the tree has incensed locals, who insist the birch was safeguarded from development, and whose existence had been cited as a reason against building a roundabout to access the school.

"They told us that the trees had got to stay, especially that one,'" said Steve Denton, a spokesman for the Broads residents.

Colin Pielou, a senior project manager for Dorset County Council, defended the felling, saying it was not a decision that had been taken lightly.

"While we had hoped to not have to remove the tree at Broads entrance, following the road safety audit it was necessary for us to do so to make the new traffic light junction safe for both motorists and pedestrians," he said.

"The removed tree was a mature birch that had a limited future life span and we will be planting new trees throughout the new school."

Preliminary design of the new junction, which will control traffic access to the Broads from the Blandford Road, was originally contracted to a private firm at a cost of £7,500.

"Mouchel were employed to do the preliminary design because at the time our own team, Dorset Engineering Consultancy (DEC), were working at full capacity on other schemes," Mr Pielou told the Daily Echo.

"Once Mouchel fulfilled their brief, the detailed design work was then passed to DEC for completion."

The completed designs have been passed by the council's road safety experts, a spokesman for DCC said.

7:00pm Wednesday 23rd July 2008

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