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WOKINGHAM town centre has had the most work carried out as non-essential shops reopen from Monday, June 15.
The most obvious to all is the closure of parking bays and narrowing of roads along Rose Street, Peach Street and Broad Street.
Although some parking bays have been removed, until at least the end of year, car parks remain open.
The aim is to extend the width of the pavements to ensure that pedestrians can pass each other and maintain two metres space.
In Broad Street, the bus stops remain open and buses are stopping on the road. This will cause momentarily jams as passengers enter and leave the buses.
Most parking spaces, including the taxi rank and disabled spaces, on Broad Street have been taken out of service.
In Rose Street, parking on the Peach Place/Methodist Church side has been suspended, but parking on the other side, which includes residents’ parking, has remains open.
It looks like Rose Street will have its exit with Wiltshire Road closed off, meaning that while cars can enter from Peach Street and Broad Street, they will only be able to exit on to Broad Street. If this happens, it will affect the buses that run through Rose Street to go towards Bracknell. It does not affect buses heading from Bracknell to Wokingham town centre.
Parts of Rectory Road and Wiltshire Road will become one lane only. Temporary barriers are at the side of the road, waiting to be put in place. This could affect the flow of traffic.
Drivers will need to take care at the start of Peach Street by The Ship Inn. Here, traffic coming from London Road and Wiltshire Road will merge into single lane traffic. This is a different arrangement to what many of us are used to, and there is currently no warning that the lanes merge.
On Peach Street, all parking bays have been suspended, including the ones outside the pizza takeaways. While this will inconvenience some, the Easthampstead Road car parks are a minute’s walk away.
The parking bays are closed over to allow Peach Street to have wider pavements, to make it easier to pedestrians.
As motorists come to the junction by the town hall, the roads return to normal.
Parking bays remain in place around Market Place, some of these are for disabled drivers, some for loading/unloading and some are 30 minutes. Check carefully as traffic wardens are now ticketing motorists again.
Denmark Street is currently as it normally is. The pavements are fairly narrow, so pedestrians will need to take care.
Purple Butterfly is one of the stores preparing to reopen tomorrow and has signs up promising that it is Covid-secure. Similar pledges are made by Stitchery Do.
There will be some road resurfacing works taking place on Denmark Street later this week; these works are due to take place over two days from Friday, June 19, between 8am and 6pm.
Elms Field remains unaffected – the newly built area, which has empty shops apart from Aldi, This Little Piggy and Everyman Cinemas, has wide pavements.
Cllr Stuart Munro, executive member for business and economic development, said: “It’s great to see our local businesses start to reopen again as they are such an important part of our local community. By shopping local, whether in one of our great independent stores or in our local markets, you are helping our businesses to survive and thrive.
“We have been working with our business community throughout the pandemic to support them by distributing £17.3million in grants and £17.5million in business rates relief. Now, that non-essential shops are allowed to open from next week, we are working hard to support our town centre businesses welcome residents back onto our high streets in a safe way.
“But it’s incredibly important that people continue to observe the rules and follow advice on how to shop safely. Everyone must take responsibility, respecting the people around them and the place they are in.”
He added that there is a risk of a localised lockdown unless people take steps to limit the risk of infection.
“This is something we can all agree no one wants to see happen,” he said.
