Castlebar Sinn Féin councillor Therese Ruane tabled a motion for last night’s monthly meeting of Castlebar Town Council calling for Main Street to be pedestrianised on a Saturday afternoon once a month in the lead up to Christmas.
The Main Street area in the town has just undergone a multi-million euro improvement scheme which has seen the whole area get a facelift, with new footpaths, public lighting, and tree planting installed to improve the traditional central business district in the town. As part of the Heart of Castlebar festival this summer, the street was pedestrianised for one Saturday which attracted a large number of shoppers and interested spectators on to the street during the day.
Speaking to the Mayo Advertiser before last nights meeting, Cllr Ruane was very positive about the possibility of her motion happening. “I think it’s something that we should try. I’ve spoken to people throughout the town and a lot of the traders over the past few weeks and people seem to be genuinely positive about it.”
Cllr Ruane said she hoped that this idea would bring the centre of the town back to its traditional home in that area. “Main Street is the centre of the town, it always has been, and we have to try to attract people back there. We have just seen the whole street overhauled and it looks wonderful, by doing something like this we could be a big boost to the business people on the street and we can create a great community atmosphere and event around it. It would only be for a few hours once a month starting off to see how it would go.”
