Network Rail had announced that it would be re-surfacing the station car park and that the work would be completed overnight on Tuesday night, March 20.
Coming from a railway company, this had always sounded a little ambitious and, sure enough, by Wednesday morning the work was a long way from being completed with large sections of new tarmac still to be laid and markings renewed.
The consequence of this was the inevitable chaos on Wednesday with tourist coaches, having found their usual parking place denied to them, parked in the bus stops in Station Approach. This meant that buses had nowhere to go except the middle of the road in order to pick up and discharge passengers. As it is also a short rest stop for some of the routes, this meant that some buses were stationary for 5 or 10 minutes while others were trying to pull out round them.
If not completed by Thursday morning, the potential for total grid lock was even greater with not only tourist coaches (having been pushed off pavements several times in the last couple of days by people whose eyes were firmly glued to a town map, the tourist season has clearly begun), but also local coaches bringing customers from outlying areas to the market.
We need not have worried. Despite the slow start, Network Rail’s contractors worked furiously throughout Wednesday with the result that by Thursday the car park was pristine with its new surface complete with all the necessary road markings. The only areas remaining untouched are the sleeping policemen (clearly considered to be in good condition) and the parking bays themselves, which, as cars had been parked their throughout the work, was just as well.
The only sign of Network Rail’s presence on Thursday was a CCTV van parked at the Rope Walk end of the car park – presumably to make sure no-one messed up their recent hard work!
Photos: John Minter
No, the CCTV van is there to prevent and detect people who drive through the red lights when the barriers are coming down, thus endangering rail passengers and themselves by their stupid actions.
The CCTV van is there to catch drivers entering the station car park illegally through the no entry sign as a traffic offence is being committed and an automatic fixed penalty of £100 plus 3 points is being issued so beware!