Free Parking

For the past week or so, Rhuthun's benefited from temporary free parking at the Park Road car park. This coincides with the disruption from Wales & West Utilities during the current Clwyd Street roadworks.

There can be no excuses for missing this. There are road signs in Clwyd Street proclaiming the deal. They're big enough.

Why, then, is Park Road really no fuller than it normally is? I honestly don't know but it could any of the factors below or a combination of them:

• People are willing to pay to park closer to town
• There is sufficient free on-street parking, in any case
• People aren't coming into town because of the roadworks
• People aren’t coming into town, period
• Shoppers prefer the Square and Well Street. The tail end of Clwyd Street is of less interest to them.

I disagree that people aren't coming into town. To me, there are no more or no fewer people than is now normal for this time of year. Whether or not they are going down Clwyd Street probably has more to do with noise & disruption than parking charges. The view I reached when the Rhuthun/Ruthin Blog Car Park Watch Team gathered all sorts of data on parking is that free parking makes little difference to shopper numbers.
Saturday sees the welcome re-introduction of the first of this season's produce markets, in the Old Gaol. Please do support it and the rest of the town. Park early, though, if you're using Park Road and it's still free. On this occasion, it could get crowded.