Shopping centre car park set for refurb (From Thurrock Gazette)
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Shopping centre car park set for refurb
10:24am Friday 7th September 2012 in News
THE multi-storey car park at Grays Shopping Centre is set to undergo a complete refurbishment.
The work will include complete resurfacing, decoration, lighting and signage, as well as a series of road improvements for easier access.
Shopping centre manager Keith Evans, said: “This is great news for Grays shopping centre and this deal paves the way for significant investment in the multi storey car park that can only be good news for the town.
“The car park will be hugely improved making it a much safer and secure place to park in the heart of the town centre.
“With this initiative, our town centre location and favourable tariffs, we hope more people will choose to use this great facility.”
The refurbishment works come after Thurrock Council signed a five year lease to occupy more than 200 spaces on the top three levels of the car park for staff parking.
South Essex College is building its new multi-million pound campus on the council’s two outdoor car parks.
Mike Wimble, from Ellandi, which owns the shopping centre along with Rockspring PIM, said: “Grays will have a best in class parking facility, in keeping with our philosophy of bringing the best in shopping amenity to local communities.
“Following on from the solar installation, the new lighting will not only be brighter and safer, but also drastically reduce the scheme’s carbon footprint.”
The work is scheduled to begin soon.
Comments(6)
Belhouse
says...
2:03pm Fri 7 Sep 12
This is the real headline.
The Council should examine its own policy promotion on Travel Thurrock: public transport, cycling, walking. When it comes down to it, it sells off its own car park and then leases around 30% of the available capacity from the nearest private car park, to the detriment of the transport choice of everyone else.
It says it is keen to restore Grays to a viable town centre with a loyalty card scheme, yet it curtails the choice of people to use it and keeps the parking charges in place. In the meantime it proudly allows expansion at Lakeside and boasts of keeping the free parking there with quotes of: "Residents of Thurrock are proud of the community that we have in Lakeside. It is an icon in the community and I am pleased Lakeside is growing" and "Officers have told us to err on the side of caution with regard to parking charges but they are not necessary."
With such hypocrisy, would the last one in the non-iconic Grays town centre please switch off the refurbished lights.
Bernard 87
says...
3:12pm Fri 7 Sep 12
jb411
says...
3:36pm Fri 7 Sep 12
Bernard 87 wrote:Most of the shops close at 17:00 17:30 most commuters like myself, do not leave work in the City until 17:00 getting to Grays after 18:00. I wouldn't walk through Grays High Street in the dark anyway.
One idea I have thought about for a while would be to allow commuters to park on the top couple floors of the car park for a small weekly fee (say £5 a week). That way you would automatically increase the footfall of people walking through the town centre, especially in the evenings which would be a good thing for shopkeepers.
Thurrock bus man
says...
7:10pm Fri 7 Sep 12
Dave_
says...
2:16pm Wed 12 Sep 12
Sell off the car parks they had already for a college that isn't needed and then rent space in a car park, that isn't really convenient for day to day use for council employees denying (although I doubt it) shoppers room to park.
I know Thurrock council isn't alone in this sort of nonsensical thought process, but why shouldn't they try and buck the trend.
I wonder how many people have something that works / does the job they need, sell it or get rid of it with no real need to, only to go and rent something that does the same job, but not really as well as the thing they had beforehand. It's no wonder Thurrock has gone round and down the S bend.
When you look at job adverts on the council website they are quite insistent on this and that qualification/experi
ence and nowhere (although I imagine all job adverts are the same) do they require commonsense.
Mattster says...
10:48am Fri 7 Sep 12