I AM writing in response to your article (Mercury, September 6, page 5) regarding the blockage of more roads in Weston town centre.

I'm a local taxi driver and on a Friday and Saturday night taxi drivers need the roads to have maximum access, for the safety of the public.

On one occasion I had a disabled lady who had a meal at Tarantella's restaurant. On a Friday, due to lack of parking at the kebab shop side and the road being closed, I had to block Oxford Street further by putting my hazard lights on and getting my passenger on board. There is no real safe access from Regent Street to get a taxi until you get to T J Hughes. Single females have already expressed their concern about walking through the First Bus passageway and prefer to get picked up on the seafront. If the main street is closed then taxis would be forced to take the Oxford Street route. This would cause more congestion and longer waiting times for the people who need to get home at the weekend. Waiting times can get up to over an hour on a Saturday night and this bottlenecking plan would make Oxford Street near impossible to reach customers.

http://www.thewestonmercury.co.uk/content/twm/postbag/story.aspx?brand=Westonmercury&category=postbag&tBrand=westonmercury&tCategory=zpostbag&itemid=WeED17%20Sep%202007%2010%3A42%3A37%3A013