Paul Hampton has vowed never to return to the city centre following his nightmare experience on Saturday
A shopper had his day completely 'ruined' after being stuck in a car park queue for over three hours after a shopping trip in Coventry. Paul Hampton, from Bedworth, took a trip to West Orchards Shopping Centre this weekend but has vowed to never visit again after his nightmare experience.
Paul, 49, said he rarely shops in the busy city centre but decided to go along, with his daughter, on Saturday (October 8). However, the shopping trip quickly turned sour when they tried to get home after he was left queuing for over three and a half hours.
Paul went to do some shopping and quickly have lunch while his daughter and her friend went to Primark. He told CoventryLive : “I live in Bedworth and I very rarely go into Coventry because I work in Birmingham, so on this instance, I thought I would give it a try again.”
He added: “We went in thinking it will be really quick. We parked up, dropped my daughter off, had some lunch, came back and then we sat in the car for three and a half hours on the fifth floor of the car park.”
Speaking about how he felt at the time, Paul said: “It basically ruined the whole day because he had other plans to do, which obviously we did not achieve. We had to do everything on Sunday (October 9) so we pretty much lost a day.”
Paul said other shoppers had been waiting around five hours to exit the car park. He said: “Some people gave up after five hours, they just abandoned the cars. We were told that if we had an appointment and were going to miss, to leave the car and go off to the appointment.”
Parents were also seen taking to their children to get food having not anticipated the huge queues, he said. Paul said: “People were leaving the driver there sitting in traffic while they went and fed their children because obviously, they did not expect to be there for that long.”
Paul has vowed not to return to the city centre and will instead drive to nearby cities to avoid the nightmare experience happening again. He said: “I will not go shopping at all again in Coventry. I will drive to Birmingham where I know I can park and get out at a decent time. I will take my money elsewhere.”
After his experience, Paul contacted West Orchards Shopping Centre who he said blamed Coventry City Council for the delays. Queues were said to frequently build in that area because of the traffic management system on the surrounding roads.
Paul said: “I think it happens quite often around Christmas because the roads cannot cope with the traffic going in and out of West Orchards Shopping Centre.”
A spokesman for Coventry City Council said: “We are aware that there were some issues for people trying to exit West Orchards car park over the weekend. The issue was caused by the volume of traffic in the area and we think largely due to drivers avoiding Junction 7 the Butts because of the roadworks there.
“This meant more people were accessing the area from Junction 9 which added to the situation. We would like to thank people for their patience while exiting the car park. Junction 7 was free flowing over the weekend – so we encourage people to use that junction to access the area – this in turn will help to keep traffic moving in and out of West Orchards car park.”
Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2022 7:31 pm