Burnham-On-Sea’s temporary town centre pedestrianisation scheme will be removed on September 6th, town councillors decided last night (Tuesday).
Members of Burnham and Highbridge Town Council met to review the latest footfall figures – which show a fall over the past year – and assess the mixed feedback from traders and shoppers before making a decision not to extend the scheme.
Part of Burnham-On-Sea High Street has been closed for eight weeks as part of the safety measures to help people stay socially distanced, which are being part-funded by the Department for Transport’s £250m ‘Emergency Active Travel Fund’.
While some shoppers have welcomed the measures for enabling them to shop safely in the town centre, some businesses say their trade has been hit.
During the virtual meeting on Tuesday night, pictured, Lorna Williams, Deputy Town Council Clerk, said: “The pedestrianisation started on 18th June and we’ve made a few changes to it along the way, which is what the council planned.”
“The pedestrianisation and the last remaining one-way system in College Street are now working very smoothly however at some point the council said they needed to look at it to re-open the High Street to traffic.”
“Looking at the footfall statistics, we don’t quite know what is going to happen in September but traditionally the numbers are still quite high. However, the population of the High Street during September is often older people. At the moment, they aren’t necessarily going to be visiting the High Street in large numbers during September.”
Cllr Peter Clayton said he’d attended a recent Burnham Chamber of Trade meeting, saying: “The feeling was that the current scheme has been working well but the time has probably come to bring back some ‘normality’ again. My personal feeling is that we’ve got the big August Bank Holiday weekend soon and it’s quite important to have the scheme in place for that weekend. I don’t think we should think about getting rid of the pedestrianisation until after that date and the children are back at school. We then can start to bring back ‘normal’ life again.”
Cllr Chris Allen said: “How do we stand if we get a second spike in, say, late September or October and we feel we need to revisit this situation? We need to think about what’s going to happen in the future.”
Cllr Clayton responded: “The approach to lockdowns will be more localised in future. So if there is a spike somewhere, the County Council will come straight back in and will put in place any necessary precautions, depending on where the issues are, rather than introducing a blanket countywide pedestrianisation scheme.”
Cllr Clayton proposed the removal of the pedestrianisation scheme for September 6th, which was seconded by Cllr Phil Harvey. A vote took place and there was unanimous support.
It was noted that hand sanitiser stations, safety guidance signs and distance markers on pavements outside shops would all continue to be in place around the town centre.
