Taffic lights will still be installed at the pedestrian crossing in the North End business centre in Oamaru, but as a compromise while a wider study is undertaken of safety issues.
That compromise was reached at a meeting yesterday between Waitaki MP Jacqui Dean, three North End business owners and two staff from the New Zealand Transport Agency in Dunedin.
It followed opposition from some North End business owners to a plan by the agency to put the traffic lights at the pedestrian crossing.
They said a wider solution was needed to improve safety, lights should be elsewhere, there would be congestion at peak times and they opposed the loss of car parks.
However, both Mrs Dean and the agency's highways engineer Ian Duncan pointed out the agency was in a difficult position.
A petition had been received for safety improvements at the crossing.
There had been 19 crashes so far this year and 15,000 to 16,000 vehicles a day passed through the area.
''It is not something we can ignore,'' Mr Duncan said.
Mrs Dean said the agency had to respond to the issues, pointing out it would get the blame if a pedestrian was hit and died.
The agency's senior safety engineer, Roy Johnston, said the issue at the pedestrian crossing was safety.
All options had been looked at and pedestrian crossing lights were the solution, but all efforts had been made to minimise the impacts.
Under the solution reached yesterday, the agency will install the pedestrian crossing lights as an interim measure, but consider modifying the plan to take into account issues raised at yesterday's meeting.
The agency would then carry out a wider safety study of the whole of the North End, possibly from Orwell St to the 100kmh zone, taking into account a safety strategy started in 2008 but not completed because of insufficient funding.
That would include considering removing some installations, traffic lights in other areas, re-routing the cycle lane, maintaining car parks, lower speed limits and other issues raised.
Mrs Dean said the timeframe for that would be determined by available funding and the agency's programme, but promised she would ''not let it go''.
That was acceptable to all the parties, although business owner Tim Arthur was worried that once the pedestrian lights were installed, they would never be removed, because of the cost.
