Cllr Dave Thomas: Open again - Torbay Road and Watcombe Beach

If you are a regular visitor to Paignton town centre and have visited over the past week or so, you will have noticed that Torbay Road has now been reopened to allow traffic to flow from Hyde Road to the car park and seafront again.

After listening to the community and talking with many hundreds of residents during the election, we knew something had to be done. Hence the Cabinet and I instructed council officers to design a scheme for Torbay Road that balances the needs of businesses, pedestrians, motorists, and event organisers.

Over the coming months we will be monitoring how the revised scheme works, to ensure any temporary arrangements can work and can be transitioned into a permanent scheme that ultimately achieves the overall outcomes of the Future High Streets Fund programme for Paignton.

If you haven’t already seen, motorists can now enter Torbay Road from Hyde Road, travelling through Station Square down to the Queens Road / Garfield Road junction before turning either left or right.

If motorists enter Torbay Road from Esplanade Road you will also be permitted to travel as far as the Queens Road / Garfield Road junction before turning either left or right. You won’t be permitted to enter from Esplanade Road and exit Torbay Road through Station Square. Signage will be in place to direct you but as this is a change for pedestrians and motorists, it will take some time to bed in so please be considerate of those using this area.

With these changes you will still have plenty of space to walk and shop safely with marked out footways along the entire stretch of Torbay Road. All loading bays will be operational between 8am and 6pm, after which they will become on-street unrestricted parking bays (between 6pm and 8am only).

I do appreciate that almost everyone has a view on Torbay Road and it will simply be impossible to please all the people all of the time. However I believe we have tried to deliver a scheme which resolves the issue of the Hyde Road/Torbay Road intersection, we have re-opened Hyde Road back to two-lane traffic and we have kept extra wide pavements on the ‘sunny side of the street’ in Torbay Road. Furthermore, we have created extra on-street parking spaces in and around Torbay Road and recreated the access from the town centre to the seafront whilst making access to the car park at Garfield Road much easier.

In other news of areas of the Bay reopening, I am glad to share that Watcombe Beach can now be accessed once again following repair works and the creation of new steps and access onto the beach.

Unfortunately access to the beach was closed in February 2020 after storms and heavy rains destroyed much of the path and the steps leading down to the beach, making it difficult to access the beach safely.

Groundwork South Trust, Watcombe ward councillors, SWISCo and council staff have worked in partnership to ensure the necessary repair works were done. This included the diversion of problematic watercourses that were causing damage to the existing path.

Led by charity Groundwork South Trust, the labour-intensive job of removing the damaged, concrete steps was carried out and new steps made from locally sourced logs have been put in their place. The repair works were part-funded by the council and the project also received £5,080 from the UK Government through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

We’re delighted that people can enjoy Watcombe Beach again, especially with the school summer holidays ongoing. Our beautiful Bay boasts 22 miles of stunning coastline and over 20 beaches and secluded coves. It’s one of the many reasons why the English Riviera is a wonderful place to live and why thousands of tourists visit the area every year.

The Cabinet and I remain committed to protecting these beautiful natural places and making them as accessible and inclusive as possible so that everyone can experience them.