BRIDGNORTH mayor Councillor Brian Jones has been rapped by town councillors and accused of ‘breaking all the rules’ for making a new call for the town¹s High Street to be pedestrianised. The council passed a resolution at Tuesday¹s meeting that distanced themselves from his public comments made last week.
Councillor Ed Shirley said that the mayor¹s views could be interpreted as those of the council as a whole, which was ‘appalling.’ “There has never been a resolution passed by this council that said anything about the status of the High Street. We should publicly say that the town council has not got a policy on this and we have no powers here it is a county council responsibility,” he said.
“I feel you have been very remiss,” Councillor Jennifer Durham told the mayor. “People are horrified at the suggestion. We must disassociate ourselves with your remarks.” Markets Councillor Adrian Tacchi said he had been bombarded with complaints from traders who said they would be forced to close if the street was pedestrianised.
“One of them was so incensed he said he might come to this meeting,” he told councillors.The mayor, who abstained from voting, said he would withdraw his remarks and make any representations to the new Shropshire Council.
“I was only reflecting the views of many people and I said in my mayor-making address I would like to see this achieved for the Saturday markets,” he said.
Councillor Shirley’s proposal that the council have never made a resolution for any proposal for the future of High Street was backed by all councillors, bar the mayor, in a recorded vote.
It added that such authority is that of the county council highways and that the town council would only ever be a consultee and had never had an estimate for funding any such scheme.
High Street traders this week condemned the pedestrianisation idea. Florist Jean Onions of Bromley’s said that people only had to look at Bilston which she claimed had become ‘dead’² since cars were banned from the town centre.
“Imagine a wet February day people won’t walk into High Street from a car park to buy a toothbrush or something like that. We have estimated that about 500 cars a day park in High Street at our end that makes a total of 1,000 cars for the whole street,” she said.
High Street butcher Richard Beaman said that High Street was the only free place in the town to park.
“It also means that people living in the street can park outside overnight otherwise they would take spaces on the pay and display car parks,” he said.