SHOPKEEPERS have branded "a disgrace" council plans to scrap disabled parking spaces to make way for a taxi rank.

A notice, posted on a lamp post on Yorkshire Street, Burnley, says that the council is planning to allow four Hackney Carriages to wait in the spaces between Hall Street and Keirby Walk currently used for four disabled vehicles.

Now the three shopkeepers, whose businesses are next to the proposed rank, are writing to the legal services department to protest about the plan.

Trouble flared in the town after the council increased the number of black cab licences from 15 to 34 without providing additions parking ranks.

Several Hackney cabs have been using Yorkshire Street as an unofficial parking rank, parking sometimes six cabs in a line on double yellow lines outside shops and across the entrance to the Comfort Inn.

Jim Baker, branch manager of Holts shoes, said: "I think we have more taxis per head of population than any other town in the country!

"I think what they are proposing is ridiculous and a disgrace. Why push the disabled out of easy access into the shops just for the sake of giving taxis some space.

"Why not look at the site opposite the rank on Croft Street near the bus station? They could fit more cars on there." Sylvia Lofthouse, proprietor of Judith knitwear and lingerie, said: "A lot of our good and long established customers who have been coming here for years now rely on the disabled spaces to come and see us.

"They park outside and can just manage to get to shop. If they can't park outside, we will lose trade. I have already seen a disabled car being unable to park because a taxi was in the space.

"I don't want taxis parking outside my shop leaving their engines running, standing around eating and shouting. It doesn't give a good impression of the town."

Johnny Berthol, of Baileys Monterey, said: "I saw an old lady arguing with a taxi driver and he was just mocking her. A lot of people shop elsewhere because of the parking problems with Burnley and it is a shame for the disabled people if they can't park near the shop."

A Burnley council spokesman said the disabled parking area had been identified as a possible taxi rank among with other possible sites, by councillors at the August 26th meeting of the planning committee.

He said the matter would be decided following the 28 statutary notice period, in light of the responses received. He added: "Nothing has been decided."

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