TRADERS have urged Cirencester Town Council (CTC) to come up with a short term fix for parking issues while a multi-storey car park is developed, to prevent further damage to business.

Dozens of business representatives attended the third Cirencester Retail Forum meeting on Monday to raise their concerns with deputy mayor Nigel Robbins and CTC chief executive Andrew Tubb.

Last month, Cotswold District Council’s (CDC) parking demand project board was given financial backing for plans for a multi-storey at the Waterloo car park in the town centre.

But with no timescale set for the scheme’s completion, traders called for CTC to take immediate action to create extra spaces.

Jonathan Davies, vice-president of Cirencester Chamber of Commerce, said: “We’re hearing numerous retailers saying trade is significantly down. There’s nowhere to park. Something really needs to be done urgently, otherwise you’re going to have some major players saying they can’t afford to stay here.”

Mr Tubb said footfall figures from the information centre “have gone from 6,000 in 2013 to over 10,000 people” and “the car parks are full” – but many traders argued these were not visitors but commuters going to work. 

Ian Holmes, a trader from Tetbury who previously owned a business in Cirencester, said: “Very clearly the existing and limited parking capacity has been increasingly taken over by all day parking by office workers. 

“That is a critical factor. We’re about 1,000 slots too short, hence the multi-storey. The big thing now is to try and resuscitate trade with the funding you have available to create every single extra car park slot you can in the short and medium term before you can develop the Waterloo.”

Builders working on CTC’s £1.4 million regeneration scheme are set to finish this week, and Mr Holmes said much of the parking issue has come down to poor planning.

“Everything that’s been done to date has taken spaces away, like the pretty new Forum scheme. We lost spaces. Even at the back of the Waterloo, the taxi rank’s never used. Six spaces there. For goodness sake, we need to critically assess and action it. Footfall is dropping.”

The regeneration work, which was due to finish in November, had previously been blamed for drops in footfall by traders, with further problems having been caused by changes to the road system, in particular on Cricklade Street.

 “It’s only right and proper that we’re upfront and we’re transparent about some of the challenges that we have faced,” said Mr Tubb. “I can’t use the line: ‘It’s on schedule’ anymore and I do apologise.

“It’s been particularly challenging dealing with literally 30 to 40 county council officers relating to the delivery of the scheme and we’ve had certain aspects of the scheme that we were told that we couldn’t complete because of fear of legal challenge because they related to the Traffic Regulation Orders.”

He urged traders to give the Market Place revamp time: “The way it’s designed now will help to generate more footfall. We haven’t even completed the scheme yet so you need to give it a chance.”

Mr Tubb said £75,000 in public funding has also been received from St James’ Place, Premier Inn and McCarthy & Stone to “go towards further improvements” and sort out “some of the issues that you are raising”.

He said the Abbey 900 festival, which runs throughout the year, will give “something for traders to get behind” while the parking board are “looking at land capability for park and stride facilities to take out commuters, like myself, who park in the Beeches” and move them “on the outskirts to free up valuable parking spaces for visitors to the town”. 

Some traders opposed the Waterloo car park being selected for the multi-storey.

Robert Pakeman, of Pakeman Catto & Carter, said the Forum would be better as “there are no residents there like in the Waterloo”.

At the last meeting in November, traders mulled over the prospect of opening on Sundays to help make up for a difficult year.

Mayor Mark Harris then sent out a questionnaire to 164 businesses, though so far only 36 have been returned.

Cllr Robbins said: “25 per cent of those said they don’t open [on Sundays] and wouldn’t consider it. We’ll leave it until next time to draw any conclusion about it. There’s more time to fill in the response if you haven’t already done so.”

The next forum meeting will take place in April or May.