Kingsclere couple recall lorry collision scare on the A339
A Kingsclere couple are concerned about more houses being built off the A339 after they were nearly run over by a lorry on the same road last year.
Claire and Malcolm Blunden were walking along the pavement on the south side of the road from Kingsclere to the Shell petrol station in September 2021.
While they waited for 20 minutes for traffic to clear so they could cross to the other side of the road, an HGV mounted the curb just centimetres in front of them.
Mrs Blunden said: “We were both in shock.
“The driver got out to see if we were okay while car drivers sat and watched us, possibly just as shocked that they were not involved in a multi-vehicle incident.
“To this day we still remember this and are thankful that we were not one or two steps forward.”
Neither of the Blundens were hurt in the incident, but they have raised their concerns about the safety of the road due to plans to build 200 homes on the land at Porch Farm next to the A339.
They believe that the placement of the large development would cause more people to walk along the same path where they nearly lost their lives.
That stretch of the A-road has seen more than 16 accidents in the last five years, several of them fatal.
Mrs Blunden said: “Nobody takes accountability while more and more people die on that road.”
Talking of the Porch Farm plans, she said: “They would have blood on their hands approving this.”
Following the HGV incident, the Blundens complained to Hampshire County Council, stating the footpath was too narrow and needed more regular landscaping due to hedge overgrowth.
The council inspected the enquiry, but found it didn’t present a hazard to highway users, something Mrs Blunden “wholeheartedly disagreed” with.
She said: “The footpath remains overgrown and at less than half the width it should be, forcing walkers to only just miss passing cars. That’s as long as they don’t mount the curb.”
“More housing either end in Newbury and Basingstoke is only going to make this worse.”
