Businesses bemoan loss of trade from road closure

Anglian Water spent a number of days repairing a burst water main on Station Road in Woodbridge

Business owners said they had been counting the cost of a town centre road closure that had left them out of pocket.

Anglian Water started "unplanned emergency works" on a main on Station Road and Quayside in Woodbridge, Suffolk, on Sunday, with work continuing until Wednesday evening, when the road reopened.

Jewellery store owner Matthew Aldridge believed there had been "up to a 50% decline in footfall" in the town and blamed the signage - as far away as Melton and the A12 - for putting shoppers off.

Suffolk Highways said this was to "allow HGVs to make the necessary decisions to avoid the closure, at the safest turning point, and this can be some distance away from the actual works".

"It just seems like no intelligence has been used for where to place these signs and someone has just slapped them anywhere and everywhere," said Mr Aldridge.

"People think they can't get into the town and so they go elsewhere – it's not great at all."

'Confusing'

Claire Flatt, general manager of a nearby bakery, said while the road closure did add extra time to people's journeys, the "confusing signage" was the main problem.

"We are very quiet, which we believe is to do with the fact that the road closure signs are so far away from where the road is actually closed," she told the BBC.

"The signage comes far too early when you are driving into Woodbridge and so people are thinking it [the town] is closed and they can't get in.

"We should be really busy but I have eight to nine tables free - we'd normally be very full."

Fishmonger Paul Newberry said roadworks were "something you have to live with"

Other shop owners claimed the road signs were putting off taxi and bus drivers from coming into Woodbridge, out of fear they might get stuck.

But Paul Newberry, who has owned a fishmongers for 20 years, said "all roadworks are a pain" but were "something you have to live with".

"It does have an impact on everyone and you might lose a bit of passing trade, but your diehards will make the extra effort to sit in traffic to get to you," he said.

"We have a lot to offer in Woodbridge and that does attract people."

Anglian Water has been approached for comment.