A PLAN for mini roundabouts to make an Oswaldtwistle road safer has been sent back to the drawing board after being branded a cheap alternative to the real solution.

Two mini roundabouts were planned for the junctions of Harvey Street and Moscow Mill Street with Union Road by Lancashire County Council in a bid to reduce accidents.

But the plans were unanimously rejected at an Oswaldtwistle area council meeting last night.

Hyndburn Council leader Peter Britcliffe, who is also chairman of Oswaldtwistle Area Council, said: "I feel that Union Road is already an obstacle course and this is just going to add to the mayhem.

"Mini roundabouts are a cheap way of avoiding putting Traffic lights in.

"And I don't think we should end up with mini roundabouts just because they won't give us the money for anything else.

"We are paying 84 per cent of council tax to the county and are asking for a bit of it back.

"Traffic lights are the real answer to avoiding serious accidents, as people aren't always sure who has right of way at mini roundabouts."

Residents and the panel agreed with Coun Britcliffe, adding that accidents are sometimes even caused because drivers do not understand the principle of mini roundabouts and that anything which occasionally stopped the traffic for a few minutes would make things easier and safer. There were 47 recorded accidents on the road between March 1 1994 and February 28 1999, but it was agreed that mini roundabouts were not the solution.

Coun Britcliffe said: "Take the scheme back to the drawing board. Bring back a scheme which is suitable.

"We need to think very carefully about schemes like this in the future and about how they are drawn up." Coun Sandra Hayes, vice chairman of the meeting, added: "It is what the people of Oswaldtwistle want that is important.

"They have to decide what is best for the area where they live.

"We have to stand together and say no to this scheme -- they can give us far better for what we pay them."

The scheme has now been withdrawn and Oswaldtwistle ward councillors will get together to devise a new scheme to take to Lancashire County Council.

This will be discussed at the next area council meeting on September 18.