CURIOUS, isn't it, that, barely six months after the village of Tockholes got a traffic calming scheme that all residents were said to have been consulted about and were pleased with, residents have overwhelmingly voted for its removal?

Yet, despite this, Councillor Jean Rigby, a defender of this overkill -- 18 speed humps and seven chicanes for a small rural road and costing more than £60,000 of public money -- insists that while it may need tweaking, the majority of people are happy with how things are.

Was she not at the packed parish council meeting on her Tockholes patch the other night where all but four residents there voted to call on the council to scrap it?

Now that the ambulance service has also said the speed humps are too high, what are the chances of democracy prevailing and the scheme being removed?

After all, the sheer necessity of this scheme at Tockholes was always questionable -- when the accident record on this country road entailed a mere 30 minor injuries in seven years and not one fatality in more than 30 years.

But when the upshot is a waste of tens of thousands of pounds, creating needless eyesores and potential new hazards and upsetting umpteen residents to boot, it is of course wrong.

But getting anyone at the town hall to admit may be quite another matter.