Last updated 19:50, Thursday, 28 August 2008

FURIOUS traders have set up a petition to stop plans to remove parking spaces from Maryport’s Shipping Brow.

More than 100 people have signed it in two days after it was revealed that a £500,000 proposal to regenerate the brow, which overlooks the harbour, would see eight parking spaces removed.

Traders claim their removal will have people going to Workington instead of trying to find parking in Maryport.

Removal of the spaces has come as a shock to retailers, most of whom thought the part of the scheme involving parking spaces had been overturned.

Last year, regeneration bosses removed plans to revamp King Street and its parking after its residents told them that it would cause serious problems for deliveries.

People on Shipping Brow and Senhouse Street thought parking was safe until Cumbria County Council issued a traffic regulation order, which included information that the eight parking spaces were to be removed.

Bookmakers William Hill has set up a petition because manager Ian Frizzle said there was no doubt that it would affect business.

Maryport and Allerdale town councillor Peter Kendall, who was party to the decision making, said even he had believed that parking would remain as it was.

He has asked to speak to a meeting of Cumbria County Council’s Allerdale local committee in Cockermouth on September 9.

He said: “The question we should be asking is what alternative provisions will be made for local residents and businesses should the parking on Shipping Brow be removed?”

Jocelyn Taylor, director of kitchen and bathroom shop Ellis Brothers, said: “We have people carrying heavy paint cans, wallpaper and the like.

“How far are they going to have to carry these things? What about the elderly people who shop here? We have little enough parking anyway, without taking away what we have.”

Staff at The Fireplace said Maryport could not afford to lose eight more parking spaces. If people could not find a space here, they would simply go to Workington where they could park.

The Fireplace recently opened an art gallery on Senhouse Street in a bid to attract more visitors to the town, but the lack of parking would be a turn-off, they said.

The petition will be presented at the local committee and people still have time to sign it, the traders said.