RESIDENTS living along the A708 outside of Moffat have slammed the ‘careless and reckless’ driving of log lorries along the ‘crumbling’ road.
The issues relating to the Selkirk road were first raised at the February meeting of Moffat and District Community Council (MDCC) by inhabitants, who stated that they had witnessed countless near misses by timber lorries travelling along the route.
And at last week’s meeting of MDCC residents Pam Duerden and John Hume reported two instances of lorries going off the road since February.
Pam said: “We were instructed by police officers to report instances of speeding, but it’s not really speeding we’re complaining about, it’s the careless and reckless driving of the log lorries and the risk of injury they pose to other people on the road.
“Since then we have had two separate occasions where lorries have gone off the road, both of those caused the closure of the road for a period of time. One of those instances saw a lorry go through a farmer’s wall and into a field -luckily he didn’t roll but it could’ve been a lot worse.
“And we are continuing to observe this careless driving, the state of the road is so bad that two cars cannot pass on it safely, let alone a car and a logging lorry.”
Annandale North Councillor Lynne Davis has taken up the cause and is waiting on a official position from council officers, but she believes that something needs to be done in the short term.
Cllr Davis said: “Unfortunately, it has taken longer than anticipated to collate the required responses from the various services to answer the questions asked and I can advise that the council position will now be communicated by the 3rd of May.”
