The markets at St Nicholas’ Collegiate Church are a vibrant part of the city and so it makes good business and tourism sense to allow them trade each day of the Galway Arts Festival.
This is the view of Floris Wagemakers of The Gourmet Offensive, who is calling on the Galway City Council to create a special event licence that would allow market traders to operate each day for the two weeks of the festival in addition to their normal Saturday and Sunday trading.
Mr Wagemakers has sent a letter to the 15 city councillors calling on them to support this proposal which the traders will be submitting to City Hall.
In his letter, Mr Wagemakers said market traders are “suffering greatly” due to the recession and he is calling for a special event licencse from the city council, which would allow market traders outside St Nicholas’ for the arts festival. “It will greatly improve their business and will also add to the vibrancy of the city,” he said.
Labour councillor Niall McNeilus said he will “fully support” this call for a full time market during the arts festival. “As a retailer myself anything that gets people into Galway and makes the city unique is a bonus,” he said. “I will be making representations to the city manager to make this work.”
In his letter Mr Wagemakers also criticised the council accusing it of “turning a blind eye” to the illegal street traders who come to Galway during the arts festival.
“This is grossly unfair towards the traders that make the market every weekend throughout the year regardless of the weather,” he said. “We also spend our money in the local economy and do not extract money out of the local economy as lots of these illegal traders do.”
However Cllr McNelis said he did not agree that the council “turns a blind eye” towards illegal street trading. “Most of this happens in the evenings,” he said, “and manpower has been cut.”
