PLANS to close Peach Street and London Road in Wokingham for roadworks has caused outrage amongst resident and business owners.
The busy thoroughfares will be closed for a fortnight in total, with Peach Street shut overnight between 8pm to 6am from Wednesday, November 4 to Tuesday, November 10 while resurfacing work is carried out.
The entire length of the road between The Ship Inn and the Town Hall will be closed.
Once those works have finished, from Wednesday, November 11 to Thursday, November 19 there will be temporary traffic lights installed on the A329 London Road between Peach Street and Binfield Road for resurfacing.
These works are scheduled to take place during the day.
Readers took to The Wokingham Paper’s Facebook page to voice their anger at the works, which are happening just months after the town’s roads reopened after the major works at Station Hill and Waterloo Road
Niki McGlynn posted: “Blimey, they are determined to drive all the poor shopkeepers out of business!”
Irene Gilder commented: “Why could whatever is being done on London Road not have been done when the recent works were being done? Does nobody have control over what happens to our road infrastructure? It is now becoming a laughing stock!
Craig Wingfield wrote: “Why don’t we just close the borough to traffic and be done with it!”
Faruk Bhuiya, owner of Baranda said that the works could have been better planned as November is one of their busiest times of year.
Mr Bhuiya said: “Of course this closure will affect us, there is no doubt. November and December are usually our busiest months, but once people see road closed signs they will turn away.
“I understand that the work needs to be carried out, but it could have been done in July or August when it is not so busy. I don’t think the council have thought it through.
“We need people to know that we are still open and to continue to visit us.”
But Andy Rogers, owner of The Redan cocktail bar, is confident that the closure won’t impact his business too much. He said: “Most of our customers tend to walk to us anyway so I don’t think these works will have too much of an impact on our business, it might just be a little quieter than usual.”
Elsewhere, delays are likely at the top of Market Place between Monday, October 5 and Friday, October 9 while South East Water install two pits and lay 12 new supplies of mains water.
