Woman breaks her leg dur to poor parking situation in Woodford Green Shirley and Rod Budgett.

Woman misses Paralympics, granddaughter’s 18th and holiday due to ‘extremely dangerous’ Woodford Green road

by Amanda Nunn Wednesday, September 12, 2012
2:02 PM

A grandmother’s summer was ruined after she was forced to miss her granddaughter’s 18th birthday and the chance to see the Paralympics at the Olympic Stadium after breaking her hip.

Shirley Budgett, 74, was helping her husband reverse out of their drive in Broadmead Road, Woodford Green as he could not see due to commuters’ cars parked in the residential street.

She then tripped up the kerb resulting in her breaking her hip which kept her in hospital for a week and confined her to her house for six weeks.

Husband Rod, 74, said: “It’s an ongoing problem. Sometimes you can see through cars and back out safely, but we had our grandchildren in the back so I asked my wife to go into the road because they parked so close.”

Besides missing the birthday and the Paralympics event they also had to cancel their holiday to America which they would have left for yesterday (Weds).

Mr Budgett said: “It’s extremely dangerous to back out. She’s had her operation and she’s moving around the house but it will be six weeks before she can get out the house.”

Mr Budgett said that his street is the nearest road to a Tube station to not have restricted parking and so attracts many commuters parking there.

He said: “There’s a continual parking problem from Monday to Friday as it’s the first road with no parking restrictions near to the Woodford Station.”

There are not any parking restrictions in place but Cllr Paul Canal says this is something that may need to be looked into.

Cllr Paul Canal said: “It’s terrible this has happened to a 74-year-old. Commuter parking is a common problem across the borough. We will look carefully at parking in Broadmead Road to see if action needs to be taken.”

He said any action taken would be done in consultation with residents.

“It’s not acceptable when people come to park their cars from outside the borough. Ultimately it’s for the resident to decide what parking restrictions they want on their roads” he added.