‘High Street closure is hitting our trade’
Businesses want street furniture to go
A new group has urged the local authority to reopen the top of the High Street to traffic and remove new street furniture it has installed outside shops or risk putting people out of business.
Perth and Kinross Council says it chose to close the road to all traffic except delivery vehicles last month to stop any potential spread of COVID-19 by giving people “more room ... to observe social distancing”.
However traders say their takings have taken a significant hit since the new furniture was put in position as they had formerly relied on much of their sales coming from customers who had previously been able to park along the street.
Imran Javed, manager of mobile phone store Mobile Solutions, was so incensed when he saw what was happening he organised a paper petition calling for the scheme to be scrapped.
He told the PA this week: “I have spoken to people in every single shop and nobody wanted this.
“It has had a very bad impact on my business. Other people have told me they are the same.”
Mr Javed has since set up a second petition online on the change.org website to drum up more support.
Now a new group representing the city’s independent traders calling itself Perth Historic Quarter has called on the council to reconsider the closure as well. It says the move seems “incredibly insensitive” at a time when businesses are already struggling to get back on their feet following lockdown.
A spokesperson told the PA: “In these already very challenging times, our local independent traders are even more reliant on an absolutely essential connection with their customers, particularly those in outlying areas with poor access to public transport and who use their cars as a ‘protective bubble’ to allay their COVID anxieties.
“Given this, we are presented with a traffic management intervention which severely restricts vehicle access - that is to say, customer access - to gain more space for pedestrians.
“With bewildering irony, we then see the arrival of ‘planters’ in the road, which effectively constrain people to even narrower footways, completely contradicting the object to improve social distancing.
“I am sure local government personnel are working very hard, under challenging circumstances and with the very best of intentions.
“Nevertheless, businesses should not be guinea pigs in a ‘let’s try this and see what happens’ experiment, and if it doesn’t work then we’ll try something else.
“It’s incredibly insensitive to impose such a huge risk on traders who, let’s remember, are not salaried and who are forced to carry the financial burden of experimentation and suffer the added anxieties of the very real threat to their livelihoods.
“While some businesses may welcome these proposals, the vast majority do not. These ‘interventions’ need to be urgently and drastically reviewed. I am glad to note that, in discussion with some council officials, there is a very real willingness for this to happen.
“We really hope we can act quickly, in concert with officials, to reappraise their intentions in the face of the very real damage caused.”
A council spokesperson said yesterday: “The council’s primary objective in introducing a range of measures to support physical distancing, including the new pedestrianised zone, is the need to maintain public safety and help prevent the spread of coronavirus.
“We have been contacted direct by local businesses regarding the measures and are currently making arrangements for a discussion with them to consider the points they raise and look at any adjustment that may be required.”