The council has “bullied” residents and is "not interested in listening" to concerns about traffic reduction measures, householders have claimed.

Since the county council agreed on June 22 to replace low traffic neighbourhoods with automatic number plate recognition cameras on three roads in Cowley, residents have complained the cameras are not wanted.

Littlehay Road, Crescent Road and Littlemore Road will have LTN restrictions enforced by ANPR cameras and residents have described this decision as “undemocratic”.

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The council ran a consultation between March 6 and April 17 this year which found that 58 per cent of respondents rejected the proposals for Crescent Road.

The proposals for Littlehay Road and Littlemore Road were also rejected by 57.5 per cent and 58 per cent of respondents respectively.

Oxford Mail: Taxi driver Sophia KhanTaxi driver Sophia Khan (Image: Sophia Khan)

Anne Stares, who lives on Littlemore Road, said: “Littlemore Road is a wide road and there has never been a problem with heavy traffic.

“There simply isn’t the volume of traffic to justify their introduction."

She added: “These traffic measures have been pushed through by a minority of politicians who don’t speak for our community.

“Members of my community feel bullied and we can’t speak out online unless we want to be the subject of abuse from eco-warrior types who have no empathy for working people’s problems.”

Ms Stares said the area had become a "guinea pig" for the council’s traffic experiments and she said leaving the house to get to places was nearly impossible.

She added: “On one occasion, my husband spent 40 minutes queuing to get out of our street.”

The introduction of ANPR cameras include exemptions for emergency services, taxi drivers and universal service providers, which were previously not possible when LTN bollards were in place.

Sophia Khan, a taxi driver who lives on Boundary Brook Road, said the cameras would be “detrimental” for residents and she said they would only lead to motorists having to spend longer travelling around them.

She said: “I’m totally against fining residents for driving around their community.”

Ms Khan said the exemption for taxi drivers wouldn’t have a great impact, as she would still need to join other motorists on “gridlocked roads”.

She said: “A lot of my customers have become very upset as their journeys have become longer and more expensive.

“My job is a lot more stressful and time consuming as a consequence of the council’s traffic measures.”

Ms Khan said she found it frustrating the council “don’t seem to care” and she appealed for councillors representing the affected communities to do more to convey to the council the disruption which the traffic measures had inflicted.

The approval of the cameras was controversial for parents of disabled children and for relatives of blue badge holders, as cabinet member for highways Andrew Gant chose not to grant them exemptions despite pleas from councillors and parents.

However, Mr Gant did promise to carry out a “further review” of exemptions for blue badge holders, health care workers and carers.

An Oxfordshire County Council spokesman said: “Oxfordshire County Council has approved proposals to install automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras at three low traffic neighbourhood (LTN) roads in Cowley – on Littlemore Road, Crescent Road and Littlehay Road.

"The cameras will replace the bollards currently in place on those sites.

“The decision was made with consideration for the views expressed during a six week public consultation on the proposals.

"The county council received a good representative response from Littlemore residents – both living within Cowley LTNs and wider Littlemore – which is detailed in the report.

"All responses were reviewed by officers in preparing the report for the decision, which was considered in detail by the cabinet member responsible.

“ANPR was proposed for the area following engagement with organisations, including emergency services.”