We should be saying No! No! No! to the proposed new car park on Clarinda Street.

Clarinda Street is the face of our town.  

It needs to be attractive not only to residents but also to visitors and others considering moving here to set up businesses or just to live, so that they appreciate the vibrant, interesting and friendly town that we all enjoy.

A car park in the middle of the town would certainly not meet this criterion and on no circumstances should it proceed.

I’ve been told that the Coles group considers that this parking area would bring a lot more business to their complex.  

This I doubt.   

The problem is undoubtedly of their own making.

When their large store first opened as a K Mart, it was always full of customers, and there were no complaints of inadequate parking space.   

When they closed down K Mart, their customers migrated to Big W where they are still to be found.

Changing this shop to a Target store was a great miscalculation.  

It does not fit the demographic of Parkes.

What woman for instance would want to buy a good outfit in a town of this size from a rack of many of the same clothes, and see others identically dressed?  

Not many I’m sure.  

And most of us would not buy say an electrical item or bed linen there if it were available more cheaply in other local stores.

I have endeavoured several times to find the right present for a friend in Target and have not yet succeeded, while  only last week I first tried to buy a narrower electric blanket there  to fit an older single bed.  

They didn’t have one, but Big W did.

Someone should say to the Coles group that we ‘think you’d better think it out again.’

I believe the paper has received a huge number of tweets against the proposal.  

I would suggest to all these wise people, and all others who agree, that they now email the council at council@ parkes.nsw.gov.au   and let our representatives know how much we all feel that this proposal should not go ahead.

Pam Nankivell,

Parkes