A Burnham-On-Sea motorist is to hand a 700-strong petition to Somerset County Council calling for a road junction where he was involved in a crash to be made safer.
Paul Carter was badly injured when his van was hit by a drunk driver at the Pipers Inn junction on the A39 near Ashcott on 7th August.
He says accidents are common at the junction and wants traffic lights installed to increase safety – although Somerset County Council says the junction has only seen a small number of accidents in the last ten years.
Mr Carter, pictured, suffered multiple injuries in the crash, including a broken chest bone and a fractured vertebrae.
People who have signed the petition agree that the junction is a “renowned blackspot”, but the council only records serious accidents and overlooks the many shunts which occur, he said.
“I do not want it to take someone being killed at the junction before they do something about it,” he told the BBC.
Mr Carter plans to present the petition to the authority at the next full council meeting in November. The petition can be accessed here.
A Somerset County Council spokesman said: “We would like to pass on our sympathies to the casualties in this particular accident but we cannot make any changes to our roads that will guard against instances of drink-driving.”
“We have no plans for any further changes to this junction. During the past 10 years there have been only 10 slight injury accidents there. Signs, lines and speed limits were changed some years ago. Only two of those accidents have happened in the last five years since the road safety changes were completed.”
Pictured: Burnham crash victim Paul Carter has launched a petition calling for safety improvements (pic: BBC)
