DISABLED residents in the Leys joined Oxford City Council officers on a walk-about of the estate in a bid to shock them into action over access.

Pete Carter, 62, from Greater Leys, and Ann Ganter, also 62, from Blackbird Leys, are both wheelchair-bound and shared their struggle to get around the estate.

Mr Carter, a former sailor and bus driver, has been using a wheelchair for the past 18 months due to a degenerative spine.

He said: “If you imagine when the Blackbird Leys estate was built, everyone worked on the factories and they were fit, strong and healthy.

“Now more people are elderly and infirm but the estate never kept up with that.

“We noticed that in Greater Leys the issues with the dropped kerbs don’t seem to be there.”

The walk saw the pair joined by various officers from Oxford City Council, together with a representative from housing association Green Square and.

They were shown a range of areas in the Leys where a lack of dropped kerbs, among other issues, could seriously hamper wheelchair users’ efforts to get around.

Turnstiles at both ends of an alleyway leading to the Kassam Stadium proved a serious issue, as well as gates to Gillians Park.

Mr Carter added: “In Pegasus Road they are putting plastic film on the windows of the swimming pool and have got a big cherry picker taking up the pavement.

“We had to go all the way back up Field Avenue – that’s a quarter-mile detour.

“The council saw the issues we had and were quite shocked.”

Mrs Ganter, from Pegasus Road, has lived in Blackbird Leys since 1979.

She has muscle atrophy in her legs and had to start using a wheelchair two years ago.

She said: “It went very well. I think they were very impressed.

“On a lot of Blackbird Leys roads there’s no handy way of getting across the road.

“Pegasus Road is the worst.”

At the same time, council officers and others toured regular hotspots to check on issues including dog fouling, littering and antisocial behaviour.

Walkabouts involving people from different agencies and the city council tend to take place in Blackbird Leys and Greater Leys twice a year.

David Growcott, the city council’s locality officer for Blackbird Leys and Greater Leys, said: “It was eye-opening. As an able-bodied person I don’t think twice about crossing the road but if there’s no dropped kerb you have to backtrack.

“I need to go away and think about the best thing to do.

“The walkabout is a very positive exercise. I think residents appreciate the fact that we had a few different agencies come down, and I think Pete and Ann found it positive too.”