Hundreds of “deeply concerned” residents have signed a petition calling for action about the “increasingly dangerous” traffic situation around Burnham Beeches.

With the nature reserve shutting half its car parks in a bid to deter too many lockdown walkers, visitors have instead been parking in surrounding roads in Farnham Common.

This has led to complaints from unhappy residents about pavement parking, forcing those with pushchairs or those in wheelchairs into the road to get past.

Nearly 300 people signed a petition calling for Buckinghamshire Council to safeguard those who live, work and walk in the area from “inconsiderate” parking.

Presenting the petition at the February 17 Beeches Community Board, Cllr Dev Dhillon welcomed the short term parking restrictions that were introduced by Buckinghamshire Council, but said a long-term solution is needed.

Cllr Dhillon said: “There has been extra traffic and parking problems around Burnham Beeches and the residents of Farnham Common are deeply concerned and unhappy about the increasingly dangerous traffic situation caused by inconsiderate parking in the roads immediately around Burnham Beeches.

“We have seen people with disabilities and those with pushchairs coming off the pavement, and taking all that, we raised a petition and I think we have nearly 300 signatures.

“We would like Buckinghamshire Council to make a provision to actually safeguard residents and pedestrians.

“We have got parking restrictions in place until August in some of the roads which does help, but we need a long-term solution.”

The petition was backed by Cllr Trevor Egleton, a regular visitor to Burnham Beeches. He said: “We need a long-term solution because as I gather, the intention of Burnham Beeches is to reduce the car parking anyway and they have reduced it drastically now by over 50 per cent to protect the Beeches.

“In accordance with their long-term plans, they don’t want to have lots of visitors to the Beeches and in the long-term, I think they are going to continue to reduce the amount of car parking.

“This petition is right and it’s even worse now within the last couple of weeks. I walk Burnham Beeches every day and have to drive up from Farnham Royal to Farnham Common otherwise I end up doing far too long a walk and don’t end up walking around the Beeches. It’s a big issue and something we need to be kept abreast of.

“There have been meetings going on for months now which we haven’t had a great sighting of as local councillors.”

Burnham Parish Councillor Carol Linton, who was also at the virtual meeting, agreed, adding: “The Beeches can’t take any more people – whatever you do with the parking, we have to get down the number of people visiting.”

In response to the petition, the council’s parking manager Mark Davis said “informal discussions” are currently taking place to address the issue in the long-term, because the current solution – using cones to mark out residents’ parking – is only allowed for up to six months.

Jack Pearce, a council officer at the meeting, added that discussions about Burnham Beeches comes alongside other areas that have also been “adversely affected” because of increased visitors during lockdown.