Green for go as new town centre car park opens for business

A £275,000 car park development at Blakewater Lodge, Whalley Range, Blackburn today (23 Oct) opened for business, providing the area and surrounding streets with enhanced safety and accessibility.

The project has seen the creation of additional 54 standard car parking places and four disabled bays. It comes in response to reported congestion and dangerous parking that affected parents and guardians collecting or dropping children off at St Michael with St John CE Primary School, along with residents and local businesses.

Coun Quesir Mahmood, Executive Member for Growth and Development at Blackburn with Darwen Council, welcomed the development, saying:

I am confident that this new facility will benefit the immediate vicinity and local community, and that we will see a positive difference in respect of both safety and accessibility in and around the surrounding area.

The creation of this extra capacity – plus the enforcement measures that will be employed – will free up surrounding streets from situations that have, frankly at times, become unsafe for pedestrians and people passing to and from the area. This provision of extra capacity is to be welcomed.

The works – financed via the Council’s Capital Fund – were carried out by contractor, Aggregate Industries and managed and overseen by Blackburn with Darwen Council’s Highways Department.

Deliberately planned to cause as little disruption as possible during the school holidays, the works have been completed within submitted timescales and – in accordance with the Council’s green credentials – have, wherever possible, sourced sustainable materials, saving 50 tonnes of carbon.