As the insightful Tony Hancock once protested, “Fancy paying good money for stuff that hurts you!” Whereas Hancock was complaining about aftershave, I’m saying it about the Phase 1 development in Charles Street, Dorchester.
The new council offices are costing Dorset taxpayers £10million and the new library a further £5million. Arguably, neither is necessary. Unquestionably, neither needs to be in Charles Street.
But they are not just a shocking waste of good money - public money - that could have been put to far better use. Their building site has also nullified an invaluable asset: 45 per cent of the Charles St car park, right on the doorstep of so many shops and businesses. And, as a direct result, Dorchester is being hurt. Every day that car park stays closed, Dorchester retailers stand to lose £22,000 worth of business. Every week, £135,000. Every month, £587,000.
Meanwhile, Conservative Communities Secretary Eric Pickles is saying: “We want to see more parking spaces to help small shops prosper in local high streets and assist mums struggling with their family shop.
“The coalition is standing up for local high streets…” Conservative WDDC must have lost the hymn sheet.
Convenient, central parking – just like we used to have – is the way to win back customers. Not the scrappy, piecemeal, round-the-houses alternative arrangements, so belatedly cobbled together by WDDC and incurring yet more public expense.
The solution, surely, is to call time now on this Phase 1 vanity project – this Flatpack Folly – and dismantle it without delay.
Reinstate the car park and promote Dorchester vigorously for its great shopping, plus its heritage, its handsomeness, its uniqueness.
Dorchester has plenty to shout about; it does not need to become another clone town.
Then, let’s plan the further development of our county town in a truly open and democratic way, and never again leave its fate in the hands of a coterie of councillors who don’t even live here.
Chris Holmes, Dorchester
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