I AM writing regarding the street parking in the town centre.

I was very angry to discover that yet more parking has been designated as disabled parking in Market Street and the side road off Market Street.

In addition, the charges in the short stay car parks are rising.

This means that if I do wish to do a quick shop in town, it will be even more difficult to find a free (very) short stay parking place, or pay 60p for an hour’s parking, which adds to the cost of the shop and is more than I require to buy a loaf etc.

What I will do in future is abandon the town centre and go straight up to Sainsburys or Merry Hill, where I can guarantee a parking space that does not add to my shopping bill.

If the purpose of the changes to parking is to drive shoppers away from Stourbridge town centre, then the council is doing a wonderful job, if however, you wish to encourage people to shop in the town, then the parking charges need to be altered, either by changing back some of the disabled spaces, introducing a lower half-hour charge, or even perhaps, charge on exit, so that people shopping in town, meeting friends etc do not have to do so with one eye on the time.

Whilst people who have disabilities should be able to access the shops, the number of spaces allocated to them seems out of all proportion with their need, as many spaces remain unused.

The provision of disabled parking should be “sufficient to not disadvantage disabled people”, not to put more pressure and disadvantage abled bodied shoppers.

I would much rather use the shops in the town centre and I will not be forced into using a bus, but along with several of my friends, and those shop-owners and workers I have spoken to, we are all worried that the message to us is that we are not wanted in the town.

Please reconsider the designation of available free short term parking in the town.

Lindsay Wade Norton