South Beach and South Shore Residents Fear Town Centre and Beach Shopping Mall Development?

 

Following another ‘space raid’ in streets near the beach in Blyth by indiscriminate drivers who abandoned their vehicles, blocking off residents and emergency vehicles to attend Blyth Town Council’s free Fireworks event on Saturday 05:November:2022 residents of both affected areas demand action to prevent further incidents from taking place.

 Local residents were left fuming that the event, fully funded by their own Town Council which included low cost Park and Ride from the Town Centre was not policed correctly by the Town Council’s partner in all things highways, Northumberland County Council and that dangerous and illegal parking was allowed to take place by drivers who didn’t give a damn about local people’s needs for access and egress to and from their homes.

 Local people posted pictures and comments on their own and the Town Council’s web sites and social media and were incensed that the Town Council had removed the posts before answering the questions regarding future parking problems near their homes and seeking answers from their responsible partner Northumberland County Council.

 Extracts and comments from social media included, comments on the fear that the new shopping mall at the beach will lead to further parking problems and that the development by the County Council of a massive monolithic building and play area on Blyth’s market place will mean that the Town Council who use the marketplace for many events throughout the year will be forced to use the beach area more and more as the valuable open space to hold events disappears under bricks and mortar.

 Blyth Town Council’s events attract thousands of visitors and the massive ranch car park was reported to be packed with vehicles with people seen walking along from Seaton Sluice car park to enjoy the event. 

The Council’s park and ride scheme did attract a good number of visitor users but residents of South Beach area reported in comments on social media that there was loads of space left in all of the Town Centre’s car parks which could have been used by the illegal and indiscriminate vehicle owners and comments on the lack of traffic management by the County Council were illuminating in their language to say the least.

 Big events have been held in Blyth previously including drawing in 250,000 visitors to a tall ships event in the harbour area of the town. Residents noted that during the tall ships event temporary residents parking permits were issued by the County Council and many commentators want that facility reopened to and for residents use to alleviate the danger and inconvenience of parking on narrow estate roads in future and demand full policing of non permitted vehicles by County Council parking and street wardens.

 The conversations about lowering the events opportunities in the Town Centre through the County Council spending levelling up cash building on the marketplace were manifold and some wanted all events cancelled by the Town Council until promises that market traders won’t demand to move to where the people park in huge numbers at the beach and have the market stalls relocated to the Beach car parks to better their trade. Questions were also asked regarding how the Town Council will manage xmas, summer carnivals, bank holiday events and a demand for a full impact assessment and a judicial review of forcing a change through developing on the market place to include the effects on beach area residents appeared to garner a good deal of support.