DRIVING instructor Gill Elmer is moving up a gear in her bid to persuade highways chiefs to make a U-turn on providing a future Christchurch relief road.

At Tuesday's meeting of Christchurch Borough Council Mrs Elmer will hand in a petition signed by some 7,000 motorists calling for action to ease increasing town centre traffic congestion which regularly results in rush hour gridlock.

"Now the holiday makers are gone it is a bit easier but when there were roadworks it was absolutely horrendous," said Mrs Elmer.

And she warned current traffic problems would be made worse by the expansion at Bournemouth airport and the impending closure of Avon Causeway for six months.

But hopes of reviving proposals for a controversial outer relief road across the precious Avon Valley are likely to be heading for a dead end.

Despite the overwhelming support of local residents and councillors the scheme for a route from the A35 Stony Lane roundabout to the A338 spur road at Hurn was deleted from Dorset County Council's local transport strategy in 1997. The roads plan is not due for revision until 2011.

Mrs Elmer said: "I understand there are problems with the Avon Valley but if we can't have the relief road there we need one somewhere else.

"We all complain about the traffic and I am trying to get something done about it.

"It has been pretty tough going with just me on my own and trying to do a full time job but I am pretty pleased with the way it has gone," added Mrs Elmer.

The petition also won the unanimous backing of the Christchurch Citizens Association town centre residents group.

Citizens' secretary Winifred Phillips, in a letter to the council supporting Mrs Elmer's petition, said: "The present gridlock within the town shows the urgent need for a relief road on the outskirts of Christchurch."

First published: October 27