A newly elected councillor is pressing ahead with plans to bring disciplinary charges against officers over their handling of the Oxford Transport Strategy.

Former Lord Mayor John Power claims they have failed to improve safety and traffic flow around the city's railway station.

Mr Power, who won the Oxford West county council seat at a by-election last week, said: "Somebody has got to be held accountable for this mess.

"I think it is the designers and engineers' fault - they have been very highly paid to make the situation worse. I would like to see the whole junction dug up and put back the way it was. It was safer and traffic flowed better." Under local government procedure, councillors wanting disciplinary action taken against officers must take it up with the head of department then the chief executive.

Councillors on the relevant committee must agree to disciplinary action.

Mr Power's move comes as council officials prepare to make minor changes to the junction to improve traffic flow after complaints.

Work will be done over the next two weeks to change traffic light phasing and install a filter for traffic turning left out of Hythe Bridge Street. An outbound bus lane in Park End Street and a new incoming bus lane near the station will also be introduced.

Mr Power said this was tantamount to an admission of failure and does not go far enough.

The county's director of environmental services, David Young, said: "These works will seek to address some aspects of the new Oxford Transport Strategy which are clearly not yet operating as well as we would like. "Reshaping Oxford's transport systems to strike the best possible balance between protecting the city and accommodating current traffic pressures is a huge job and we couldn't realistically hope to get it right in one go.

"Getting our transport system right is crucial to the success of Oxford as a city to live, work and shop in and we are doing all we can to complete the fine-tuning as soon as possible.

"Oxfordshire County Council will not be satisfied until the new transport strategy is doing the job it was intended to do - promote and protect Oxford."

Story date: Friday 05 November

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.