Madam,

Speaking on behalf of some the shopkeepers and small business owners of Dolgellau, there is a strong feeling that someone needs to be held accountable for the fiasco that was the Dolgellau start of the final stage of the Women’s Cycle Tour of Britain. This was a momentous opportunity to benefit from a major international event; the largest women’s professional cycle tour in the world. However it was blown through a lack of any meaningful communication or publicity from Gwynedd Council and Dolgellau Town Council. What little, and seemingly random, communication that appeared was inadequate and even completely inaccurate; the map showing road and car-park closures, for example, was wrong in several details which caused great confusion. The bad feeling throughout the town in the build-up to the event was palpable with shopkeepers and B&B owners disseminating what information they could find between themselves.

As a result car-parks and streets were empty, shops were closed, the market was cancelled and the race organisers and riders were bewildered by the lack of spectators and public participation. Shops that had made the effort to open and take part were hidden behind hoardings or had access to them blocked by event vehicles. The situation was so dire that at one point race organisers were actually apologising to shopkeepers for the way things had been managed and saying that if the town/county councils had spoken to them they would have arranged things differently.

The sight of leaders of the town and county councils indulging themselves in the ‘VIP’ hospitality area was nauseating and an insult to all those businesses which lost income and to Dolgellau itself whose empty streets shown on national TV were an embarrassment.

Yours etc,

Peter Barnes, Cader Road, Dolgellau.

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