A “land locked” school has been given permission to create a new entrance, despite fears the plan could lead to traffic chaos.
Horton Grange Primary School currently has no entrance on a public road.
Pupils enter the school either via an entrance on a pedestrianised section of Spencer Road, or through a shared entrance with neighbouring Farnham Primary School on Stratford Road.
The school has said the use of this shared entrance, which sees hundreds of pupils from two schools converge on a single entrance, was no longer suitable.
The school proposed creating a new entrance on Farnham Road.
Horton Grange is in a “block” that also includes Farnham Primary, Farnham Road Children’s Centre and Margaret Macmillan Children’s Centre.
The new entrance to Horton Grange would be between the two children’s centre entrances.
There had been 50 objections to the plans, many of which were from residents of nearby roads who claimed the entrance would lead to gridlock, and could cause road safety issues.
One claimed the primary school children using the entrance would “intimidate” and bully the children at the nursery in the neighbouring centre.
The application went before Bradford Council’s Bradford Planning Panel on Wednesday morning.
Hamid Zafar was one of the objectors to the plan, and spoke at the meeting.
He told members: “This will increase highway safety concerns on the road.
“There are no benefits to this plan that could outweigh the potential of fatalities or injuries.
“It will have a great impact on highway safety and residential amenity.”
He told members of the panel that there had recently been an accident that saw a car crash in the area of the proposed entrance.
He said: “If children had been using the gate at the time it would have led to fatalities.
“One death will be a death too many.”
He said parents already parked dangerously on the street, and he felt the new entrance would make this situation worse.
Head of the school Rebecca Marshall told the planal that the school sat on a “very complicated” site.
She said she understood concerns of residents, but added: “The children are my responsibility, and we will have staff stood at that entrance ready to welcome the children.”
She said parents already parked on Farnham Road, and walked their children to the existing entrances. The new entrance would mean drop offs would be shorter.
Richard Crabtree, estates officer for Exceed Academies Trust, said: “At this point this new entrance is a necessity for the school. If we don’t have this entrance there will be safeguarding issues at the rear entrance, where we get a lot of off road vehicles.”
Members voted to approve the plans, on the condition that new security barriers be installed outside the new entrance.
