Cars have no place travelling past shops – Shropshire Star

Where did Katy Anderson of CPRE find her figures for traffic in Shrewsbury town centre? Nationally car ownership has tripled in 30 years, those driving to work by car has almost doubled in the same period.

While about half as many people travel to work by bus, bike and on foot as in 1980 only the train has held its share at less than one per cent.

Against this massive shift in prime time travel habits, a small drop in cars entering the town centre - from 25,000 in 2005 to 22,000 in 2008 seems less significant.

Meanwhile, the town centre is still an Air Quality Management Area because of pollution and new science has just revealed that this is much damaging to children's health than we had previously understood.

The killer in every sense is cross-town traffic. This does nothing but harm to the town centre - it literally has no business there, but brings danger to pedestrians, damage to the historic fabric and pollution.

Shops do not need traffic rolling past their doors, they need people walking through them. There are signs that Shirehall is concerned, but a huge amount of work needs to be done.

The three-point plan offers a blueprint for managing traffic, so that access to the town centre for cars is improved but passage through it is hindered. This way we can increase visitor numbers and make Shrewsbury the attraction it should be.

Andrew Bannerman
Shrewsbury