Traffic Wardens in Bury do not take prisoners. Five minutes over your time and you are booked.

I work in Bury. Often I park in the old railway station, but I need to be in and out of Bury, sometimes three times a day, so I park on the High Street.

Sometimes change is just not available. Sometimes clients take more than the time allotted to them by the council.

There is no place to hide. Most traffic wardens will sniff out your car and plonk that ticket on your screen. I know they have a job to do and they only follow the rules dictated to them - but the do follow them well, don't they.

I used to come into town on a Saturday to shop for a couple of hours. We have children. My wife prefers to park on the High Street because it is too much fuss going into the multi-storey with children. Yet one hour is the maximum. You cannot do much shopping in an hour.

So we do not shop in Bury any more: we shop in Manchester on a Saturday. There is much more leniency in Manchester town centre on a Saturday afternoon, and now we have Dumplington. There have already been announcements about coach trips from Bury straight to Dumplington at minimal fares. Parking there is free. It will be a shoppers' paradise, the biggest in Europe.

Bury is a lovely town. It has charm, panache and a good set of shops . . . yet the motorist is so important to the success of any business.

The motorist is finicky. He will drive for an hour, spend pounds on petrol and, ironically, would rather do this than spend half the money parking his car! Motorists just do not like paying to park their car. Maybe it is the culture of the country.

I believe that, essentially, our council does not like the motorist and that some councillors do not see why any motorist should bring a car into town. Well, they should wake up to what is happening in front of their eyes. This is what I suggest . . .

ZParking on the High Street should not be limited to one hour but to three so that serious shopping can be done.

ZDaily parking tickets which allow drivers to park anywhere in town on a particular day.

ZContract parking should be introduced on those car parks where it has been taken away.

ZTo combat Dumplington, the council should reduce the cost of parking to a fraction of the current charges, or dispense with it entirely for a trial period.

ZTraffic wardens should be told to act with a sense of humour and to do the job in a more friendly and relaxed manner.

B. H. SLATER,

Slater Links Solicitors,

Bury.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.