Just before the end of last term parents at Katherine Semar Schools were sent a Parentmail advising that “…from January there will be no public access to the Goldenacre Car Park…”. Parents use the Goldenacre Community Centre car park daily at both school drop off and pick up times. The car park accommodates circa 25 cars at any one time, that means 25 fewer cars fighting for parking spaces along the residential roads around the schools.
According to one long term local resident, who moved in prior to the Community Centre being built in 1986, there has always been an unwritten agreement that the parents of children at the schools (both built before the Community Centre) could use the car park.
Numerous angry parents contacted the Town Council to complain and wrote to the local papers. In what appears to be a victory for common sense, on the 31st December 2014 the Walden Local announced that “A compromise has been reached for the time being regarding parking at the Goldenacre Community Centre…Saffron Walden Town Clerk Gordon Mussett confirmed on December 30 that the barriers which were put in place before Christmas, in order to make parking more easily available to those attending events at the Centre and to prevent overnight parking, would be removed in time for the start of the new school term on Monday January 5.”
This decision is only temporary and the issue will be back on the agenda for the (new) Town Council after the elections in May.