Letter to the Editor: Mitcham suffers because the market has been a flop

In reply to Councillor Peter Walker's comments in the Wimbledon Guardian, I would like to make the following comments.

I belong to several focus groups and so far I have only met one, possibly two from all of the people in those groups and many outside with whom I have spoken that agree with a bus lane through the Fair Green.

As for 6,000 additional passengers alighting at these proposed bus stops, I would question that. If 6000 people are getting on or off at the new stops that would equate to 3000 on and 3000 off.

Are these the same people who would get on or off at the existing stops?

Why would they get off at the Fair Green instead of continuing onwards? They need a reason, not just a new bus stop.

Or is it that it was, again, a loaded question: "Would you get off/on at a new stop at Fair Green if you are getting off/on in that area anyway"?

I would really like to see the data on that one, showing who they asked what were their normal journeys and why they don't get off in Mitcham now.

How do the Lidl and Iceland owners/customers feel about having to walk further and the shops on that side of the Fair Green. Or don't they count?

This really is biased towards Morrisons and the market traders, not towards other shops in Mitcham centre.

Coun Walker suggests that there is an overwhelming number of residents who recognise this proposal to bring buses back to the Fair Green will increase footfall in the town centre and therefore greatly assist regeneration of the shops and businesses there.

That is because the survey carried out was, in my opinion, badly worded to produce the result it did.

Don't get me wrong, I am a great supporter for Mitcham and improvements to it and a cinema would be excellent.

I just don't believe that the proposed bus lane would give the impetus for that number (6000) of extra people to stop at Mitcham, other than they would do if the bus stops were where they are now.

If people wanted use a cinema in Mitcham, just like they used to and I did many years ago, they would get off at the most convenient stop. Whether that is the 118 bus stop by the Post Office, the stop at Lidl or the stop on the Fair Green where it is at present.

If you cannot see the way the questions were loaded in the survey, then I am sorry. Many did.

The question wasn't 'Do you want buses going through the middle of the Fair Green, splitting it in two?' - it only asked 'Do you want buses into the Fair Green and London Road so they stop closer to the shops?'. There is a subtle difference in the wording that means a lot.

What shops do you refer to? It is a wider area than just the green. The buses already stop on the Fair Green from one way, only 20-30 yards difference, and by Lidl from the other way.

If the problem is with the number of road crossings to get from Lidl to the Fair Green piece, I have already proposed to the council a simple and very cost effective method of reducing these road crossings down to two with no impact on traffic flow.

I don't agree with you on the point that the pedestrianisation of the Fair Green failed to attract people into the centre of Mitcham.

What failed was the spread of shops and the market. There are too many of the same types of shops in the centre and not enough variety. This was the fault of the licensing authority who allowed too many of the same.

There has been little encouragement for new shops and busnesses in terms of rates etc., for them to be attracted here.

The market has been a flop. There has been little control on how it works and where the stalls are placed no comformity to the styles of stalls.

If the stalls were that good people would walk an extra few steps to get to them as they do in other market areas like Croydon. People actually travel to that market. If the stalls were made to have a uniform style and were placed along the road/walk between the two public houses and at the area at the tip of the throughway, together with good quality stalls selling the products that people wanted, then people would go there.

The problem there, of course, is that the local shops like the "pound shops", Morrisons, Superdrug and others would be in direct competition with the market and so one or the other will loose out. That is why the market is failing.

I really hope that something can be salvaged from the situation because, if it goes ahead and proves a failure, where do you go from there? Nowhere.

This plan is too much too quickly, a bit like a Bridge Too Far.

By all means, create a plan using the initial £3m that deals with the shops fronts, the landscaping and the rationalisation of the market stalls and see how that works with a cinema as well.

If that hasn't produced what you want, then that is maybe time to considered a more complex plan with a through road or something else.

But until that please don't rush ahead because TfL are offering an extra £3m. The two should not be inextricably linked.

If they are offering it today, I am sure they will offer it tomorrow or in five years time.

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