There was a final good reason for me to be at the Traffic Management Panel this evening - but for the agenda item that I did not expect any debate on.
One of the parking measures agreed was an extension of the loading ban on busy Crown Street (the main A4 into Reading) seven days a week. This has had to be introduced to stop Tesco delivery lorries (which all seem to be articulated, the biggest possible, of course) parking on this main road, often on the pavement, to unload.
Yet at the meeting cryptic warnings were given about 'issues regarding potential litigation'.
What are these then?
(A good question: I am only a ward councillor for the area, so naturally I have been told precisely nothing)
It appears that Tesco have, predictably, been breaking all the rules about loading and unloading, be it on London Street (a major bus corridor and a Conservation Area with listed buildings and paving slabs) or Crown Street. It appears that, because of them loading at unsociable hours, they have been served a noise abatement order (and rightly so: dragging a trolley down paved streets outside people's homes at 6am is pretty antisocial).
And, apparently, Tesco has now sent the bully boys in to threaten and intimidate the Council with legal warnings, when it's Tesco who think themselves above the law. (Behaviour more commonly subscribed to gangsters)
I must say that I'm looking forward to hearing the formal report of this, but I can report it here as it was all said at a public meeting. I was always baffled why Tesco chose a corner side with barely any parking and nowhere for all but the smallest vehicles to load and unload. (As a senior Council person - who must remain anonymous - commented, they must have been incredibly poorly-advised to choose that location).
Someone has to stand up to Tesco and their corporate gangsterism. I hope that Reading Borough Council does. I will certainly be pressing for them to do so in the strongest possible terms.