A PRESTWICH solicitor has accused Bury Council of "mismanagement" over the state of traffic in the village.

Aubrey Isaacson claims officers are doing very little to address the traffic congestion problems and wants them to make the issue a priority.

His concerns are echoed by local councillors who made traffic congestion the top agenda item at Monday's area board.

Mr Isaacson, whose office is in Scholes Lane, said: "To travel the short stretch from my office to Fairfax Road takes 20 minutes and it is only three quarters of a mile. cars are nose to tail and it is absolute misery. Everybody complains about it and I see it every day. It cant be good for the environment."

Mr Isaacson said the problem had got worse over the past six months and believes the introduction of parking bays along Bury New Road have contributed to the situation.

"While I understand that the parking bays are good from the shopkeepers point of view, motorists are being forced to travel in single file," he explained. "Before they were created cars could travel two abreast and the flow was much easier. The better solution would be to acquire a derelict property in Bury New Road and create a new car park so it could go back to two lanes. People are not going to stop using their cars."

Mr Isaacson has written numerous letters to Bury Council about the subject and is dissatisfied with their response.

Transport bosses explained that a new computerised traffic control system called SCOOT was due to replace the existing system in late autumn and it would be premature to try and implement further changes in advance of assessing its benefits.

Mr Isaacson added: "I just get the feeling that the traffic planners at Bury Council are being paid a nice fat wage and not actually doing anything about the problem. Bury New Road has been rendered chaotic by the clear mismanagement of traffic planners. It is apparent they have made a complete botch of this job. I dont believe it will get any better with SCOOT as it will still be single file."

Chairman of Prestwich area board, Coun Vic D'Albert, said his fellow councillors were so "fed up" of having their casework jammed up with the issue of traffic congestion that they had invited traffic engineers to listen to residents frustrations first hand.

Coun D'Albert said: "Traffic congestion in Prestwich is not a laughing matter and people's tolerance to the problem is wearing very thin. We have a growing local population who expect to have cars and if we dont act now, total gridlock will happen. We hope the traffic engineers can reassure us that traffic flow will improve and that measures are in place to deal with it."

Coun D'Albert said that as well as needing better ways of managing traffic flow, the council needed to encourage better use of public transport and a reduction in school runs by car.