Controversial plans to fell a number of trees and widen a busy road in Great Missenden should be immediately halted while HS2 is under review, a former district councillor has said – as a petition to scrap the decision gains more than 1,500 signatures.

Former independent district councillor for Great Missenden, Seb Berry, has urged Bucks County Council not to go through with work to widen Link Road in the village – which will also see a number of trees felled.

He set up a petition, which has had the backing of 1,511 people so far.

The road widening is due to start on Frith Hill and Link Road on Monday, October 7, for up to 18 weeks.

Link Road is the main route in and out of a village which contains three schools, between them accommodating nearly 2,000 pupils, an international attraction in the form of the Roald Dahl Museum with around 60,000 visitors a year and a popular Chiltern Line station with a 580,000 annual footfall.

Mr Berry says the temporary closure of the main road will cause “huge disruption” to traffic and village life well into 2020.

He said: “It beggars belief that this massively unpopular county council road widening scheme is still going ahead, despite a Government review of HS2 and Bucks County Council’s stated public opposition to such enabling works. 

“It’s doubly frustrating as Link Road widening was first put forward by our county council not HS2 Ltd over three years ago, despite my strong objections at the time and those from other local representatives. 

“The village association is right to call for these works to be halted, pending full and proper consultation with local residents and businesses.”

In a statement, Great Missenden Village Association said it was “deeply concerned about the impact that these unnecessary works will have on our historic village”.

They said: “The road widening project is now planned to progress despite HS2 being under review. The Association believes that the 'enabling' works to the Link Road must be paused and the local community must be properly consulted. This level of consultation has not been experienced to date.”

Bucks County Council deputy leader and cabinet member for transportation Mark Shaw said that the county council had recently written direct to the Prime Minister asking that all enabling works be halted until the full outcomes of the ongoing HS2 review are made clear.

“Unfortunately the Government didn’t agree to our request, and while I understand residents’ frustrations, we as the county council have no powers to change this,” said Mark.

“We originally petitioned for this scheme because if HS2 does go ahead, the extra construction traffic will increase congestion in the area and make it even more difficult for local residents to access the A413 from Link Road in particular.

“As these are HS2 works, I can only advise sending the petition direct to them to consider the weight of feeling locally. Their email address is HS2enquiries@hs2.org.uk or they can be contacted using the Freephone number 08081 434 434. What I can add is that we will be monitoring this work very closely to minimise disruption for all our local residents and businesses."

To sign the petition, go to https://bit.ly/2mRlV1t.