Wrong way to be addressed

We had visitors to stay last weekend who are travelling to Australia, Japan and China shortly, so we thought we would print the tall ship poster off for them to take on their travels and tell them all about the Wear.

We decided on Saturday to take them to visit the National Glass Centre, then have a walk along the river followed by a visit to Roker beach.

On parking up, we paid a fee and had a nice walk along the promenade. Up to this point all was fine, however, I decided to drive down to the marina to show our visitors the harbour.

We parked up and proceeded to walk along the marina to look at the brick sculptures by local schools that are set in the walls, only to be approached by a rude man informing us we were not allowed to park as it was for people using the facilities and that it was clearly posted, so we should move the car.

We explained we where showing some visitors around, but he was clearly not interested, a real jobsworth attitude.

My point is there is a right and a wrong way to address the public, we where going to use the Snow Goose Cafe as we have in the past, but this attitude made our guest feel unwelcome and gave a poor image for the city, after all the North East has a reputation of being a friendly place.

Sunderland should be doing all it can to showcase the city in preparation for these important tourist attractions.

Doug Reynolds Dykelands Road