'Win for sense' as Father's Day roadworks date changes

A Wigan businessman has hailed as a victory for common sense a council decision to avoid blocking access to a popular pub on Father's Day.
The Crooke Hall InnThe Crooke Hall Inn
The Crooke Hall Inn

David Mayhall, a partner in AllGates, said it would have been devastating for the Crooke Hall Inn if the town hall had allowed re-surfacing work on Wigan Lower Road to go ahead on Sunday.

The move would have meant no access to Crooke Road, leaving the popular canalside pub and eatery dependent only on walk-up trade coming along the towpath or from the immediately surrounding houses.

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Fortunately, following the intervention of Shevington Lower Ground ward representative Coun Paul Collins the local authority has agreed the work can take place on June 24 instead.

Mr Mayhall said: “Common sense prevails. I’m very happy that Wigan Council has agreed to do this.

“I absolutely agree the work on the road needs doing but if the weather is decent, Father’s Day is our second busiest day of the year. We already have people booked in for meals and a party of 50 in the function room.

“We’ve already been affected this weekend while the S-bends were resurfaced. That badly needed doing but it meant anyone coming from Shevington had a huge diversion. Two weekends in a row would have been massively damaging.”

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Coun Collins said: “I’m glad this issue has been resolved. To be fair to our highways engineers they work 24/7 year round on highways somewhere in the borough and it is inevitable that there will be odd clashes but hopefully this change is satisfactory.”

Mark Tilley, Wigan Council’s assistant director for infrastructure, said: “The planned road resurfacing has now been rescheduled to the following week, to ensure the disruption to the surrounding area and local businesses is as minimal as possible.”

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