Letter: A ‘Car-free Day’ Would Be An Excellent Opportunity

Published on: 26 Jun, 2020
Updated on: 26 Jun, 2020

Onslow Street traffic

From Bill Smith

In response to: Surrey Rejection Of Car-Free Day In Guildford ‘Undemocratic’

The “Car-free Day” would be an excellent opportunity to show how the High Street and certain parts of town could be transformed to benefit and promote local business, get some alfresco socially distanced dining and drinking happening, and make the town centre work for the community instead of trying the same old consumerist shops.

Contrary to the comments of some other readers, I believe it would be pretty easy to reroute roads and still maintain access for those who need it, the less abled, deliveries and so on. It’s only a lack of vision driving opposition to this.

Regarding the comment that it was only 321 signatures, I remember this being launched, with only about four weeks to collect signatures, so 300+ is huge in that time; you only need to look on GBC’s e-petition page to see how decent this is in comparison to other petitions, so this argument is nonsense.

The fact is we have an incredibly congested town centre, causing heart disease, lung cancer, and depression, all of which are linked to emissions. Our High Street is dying, so continuing down the same path we’ve always done is not only foolish but hugely detrimental to the town. Surrey County Council needs councillors who actually care about the boroughs and the communities in them.