PARENTS are celebrating victory after finally getting approval for £25,000 towards road safety measures outside their children's school.

And they thanked the Ealing Times for backing them after councillors allocated the funds for improvements to be carried out near St Gregory's RC Primary School.

Copies of the newspaper's coverage of this story were handed out to councillors before the meeting commenced last Wednesday. Campaigners filled the chamber and held up brightly coloured posters.

St. Gregory's School, Woodfield Road, Ealing, has not had a patrol crossing officer outside the school since the last one left in Autumn last year. Since then, parents have been working tirelessly to get their voices heard to get a zebra crossing.

Woodfield Road is extremely busy and narrows just outside the school causing congestion as traffic piles up in both directions which restricts a clear crossing area.

The road is also a bus route with several stops on either side just a few yards away from the school entrance.

Simon Hall, chairman of St Gregory's Parents' Association, declared the result a victory for the community as well as for the parents. He said: "We are very jubilant with the result as it has recognised that the whole school community has come together.

"We are grateful to the council for recognising our plight and realistically what we want now is to see how quickly they can get things moving. The children's safety is of paramount importance.

"We would like to thank the school's community for their support and the Ealing Times for the coverage of our campaign."

Although £25,000 has been allocated for some sort of road safety measure, it is not confirmed whether the money will be for a zebra crossing. The proposals will now go through a consultation period where the council will liaise with residents in the area surrounding St Gregory's to see which road safety means are appropriate.