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YOUR VIEWS: Proposed car ban in part of Inverness city centre


By Gregor White

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Would Queensgate be improved by pedestrianisation?
Would Queensgate be improved by pedestrianisation?

A suggestion that part of Inverness city centre should be pedestrianised prompted a lively public debate.

The Courier revealed last week that city councillors will be asked today to undertake a "reimagining of the city" it is claimed will bring more people into the centre and support existing businesses.

Councillors Ron MacWilliam and Glynis Campbell-Sinclair have called for the possible pedestrianisation of Union Street and Queensgate to be investigated.

Here are just a few of the responses we have received on the idea:

Turning the centre of Inverness into an 'Active' space and encouraging people to cycle and/or walk as much as they can is great. But I have put some of this in italics for a reason – as much as you can really, really needs to be thought out carefully. There needs to be compromise and an understanding of the needs of the many different people who visit the city centre

Imagine the 67-year-old woman who lives 14 miles from Inverness carrying two full reusable containers of washing up liquid and laundry cleaning from a shop in the city centre to her car parked in Rose Street car park. Cutting down on plastic and reusing is something she has cared about long before reusing and recycling became the buzz it is today.

Imagine that same 67-year-old woman has a health condition that means: various joints all around her body can 'kick off' any time; that fatigue levels fluctuate considerably day-to-day; that 'fog brain' too can sometimes be an issue. All of these symptoms and the degree of effect is totally unpredictable. That same 67-year-old woman carries her two 5-litre full containers back to her car. She has to rest several times as her right wrist starts to get sore, tiredness sets in and by the time she gets to her car, the right wrist is not just sore, it is down right painful and has swelled up.

Now I do NOT want sympathy because tomorrow it may have been a different story with no effect at all or possibly different joint(s). I just don't know, that is what it was like today. Because of the variability I neither want or need a 'blue' badge. But all I would ask is this: is this the experience you would want for your 67-year-old mother? And looking around the town today it did seem to me that the biggest majority by far of the people who were "out-and-about" were not dissimilar to my age group.

So can we not come up with some compromises – it doesn't need to be an all or nothing scenario. Perhaps let vehicle access and parking happen at certain times and other times let the free flow of people happen? Please, please, please let's come up with a plan that suits the needs of as many people as possible – fit, less fit and those from the hinterland which Inverness also serves.

Margaret Saunders

Moy

Union Street may also be considered for pedestrianisation under proposals from two city councillors.
Union Street may also be considered for pedestrianisation under proposals from two city councillors.

Don't like the idea one little bit.

Are you aware that this would effectively wipe out all the disabled bays in town?

They have already discontinued the bay at the top of Church Street, which would leave two only at the lower end of Church Street.

Admittedly that might only affect a small number, but would be totally unfair.

I'm sure they would refrain from coming into town, which is already an obstacle race.

I don't see how it would be possible to accommodate disabled bays elsewhere?

Alasdair Dowling

Disallowing cars in Queensgate and Union Street would effectively bar me from town.

I am debilitated and disabled, I am not a wheelchair user but unable to walk further than 20 metres, so I would be denied being able to go to Duncan Fraser to choose my butcher meat, or use the post office for example.

I oppose the proposal in principle on my own behalf and other people with disabilities.

Denise Stewart-Thomson


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