Traders fury over parking

Traders are struggling to unload deliveries in their Kidderminster street because shoppers keep bagging the parking spaces, they claimed today.

Businesses in Lion Street are holding an emergency meeting next week to try to tackle the problem and have appealed to Wyre Forest MP Richard Taylor for help. They claim council workers are taking many of the spaces on pay-and-display areas, forcing an overspill of shoppers into their street.

Now they want spaces at the front of the shops allocated to them so that they can run their businesses, and they are calling on Wyre Forest District Council to issue them with parking passes

Many have recently been warned that council parking wardens will soon begin taking action if they double park and they are worried that they could soon face fines.

They have set up an emergency tenants meeting to be held at the Lion Hotel at 2pm next Wednesday.

Viv Lapham, aged 53, from the Antiques Centre in Lion Street, said: "We often have to move heavy furniture upstairs and often there is not enough room to open car doors and I have to park in the road. It will be impossible if they begin to enforce the parking, which I think they will from next week. With a 30-minute turnover it is impossible to get a space and quite often there is a queue of traffic waiting for spaces.

"We did have a loading and unloading bay but this was taken away because its use could not be enforced."

Brian Murdoch, aged 68, who owns properties along Lion Street, said they were holding the meeting to see what the councillors could come up with, as the tenants were keen to comply with the law.

He added: "We are concerned that notices warning of possible action have been handed out. We need help. Business is bad enough as it is. This is just another dagger in the back for many of the tenants."