Lake Macquarie City Council is considering several options to up-grade the Dunkley Parade interse-ction, which is less than 200 metres from the school.

Initial council plans flagged a roundabout as the best option, costing $800,000 and lasting 20 years, with a $700,000 state grant used to place pedestrian lights in front of the school.

The second option of traffic lights further down the road would cost $1.4 million and last 10 years.

But a newly-formed community committee say an Aldi supermarket planned to be built next to the school would worsen the traffic flow.

Mount Hutton Road Safety Committee president Jason Brown said a roundabout would complicate the area with merging lanes and would make it dangerous for students wanting to cross the road.

“We had 142 people at a public meeting last week all in favour of traffic lights,” Mr Brown said.

“The next intersection further up the road is federally recognised as a Blackspot, and people are coming down around a blind corner towards the school.

“We are getting all our research together from the ambulance, police and fire brigade just to show how often accidents happen on the road.”

A spokesperson for Lake Macquarie City Council said Councillor Kay Fraser raised the issue of council officers investigating the cost of other options further at last week’s council meeting.

This included installing traffic lights or opening up Warners Bay Road, which is currently blocked off at the top of Dunkley Parade.

The spokesperson also said a fibre-optic cable rumoured to be under the Dunkley Parade inters-ection was not a factor in favouring the roundabout.

The Aldi development application is still under assessment no timeline has been set for its approval.

The Mount Hutton Road Safety Committee plans to speak at the next council meeting on Monday, February 15.