warns

of wrong

path

A CHARTERED surveyor last week tore a strip off Cheshire County Council for seemingly making Knutsford's pavements even narrower.

Robert Newton, 53, claimed contractors, who are currently resurfacing King Street, had left some parts of the footpath unusable by the disabled and mums with prams.

"I understood that they we're going to reinstate the paths not reduce them," he said.

Mr Newton, who works at Meller Braggins in Princess Street, told town councillors at their meeting last week that the footpath outside Goostrey's in King Street had been reduced by about three inches.

"It's losing 10% of the footpath. That makes it too narrow for people with prams and wheelchairs to get past," he said. "If people are parked down there it means shoppers will have to go onto the road and dodge the cars."

Town mayor Tony Ranfield said councillors would write to Cheshire to express their concerns.

Shopping

But last week a Cheshire spokesman insisted the paths were no narrower.

"As far as we are aware the kerb line is the same as before," she said. "We have taken the old kerbs out and replaced them with the new kerbs."

Workmen are due to finish resurfacing the road, kerbs and footpaths between Church Hill and Minshull Street on Friday next week. But the work, which began three weeks ago, has not been without problems.

Last week salesman Bob Bracewell, of Mere, told how he had suffered bruised ribs, a sprained wrist and cuts to his hands when he fell into a trench that had been dug by workmen.

Cheshire's spokesman said officials would investigate the accident if Mr Bracewell made a complaint.

But other residents already avoid King Street.

"I don't go down there now unless I really have to," said Dorothy Fuller, 87, of St John's Road.

She told the Guardian how she recently needed hospital treatment for an injured tendon after trying to manoeuvre her husband's wheelchair through Knutsford's streets.

"If they make the paths any narrower old people are not even going to get things like shopping trolleys around," she said.

amccreaddie@guardiangrp.co.uk