Call for attendants at Leighton Buzzard multi-storey car park to help tackle anti-social behaviour

The lift has been vandalised, while there have been sporadic incidents of anti-social behaviour with supermarket trolleys pushed off the car park roof.

Bedfordshire Police suggested to Central Bedfordshire Council that it pays to put up some barriers, or alternatively closes off the top deck.

Independent Leighton Linslade West councillor Steve Owen wants the lift repaired quicker than the September deadline indicated by the local authority.

He told CBC’s Leighton-Linslade partnership committee: “I inquired about the prolonged outage of the lift at the multi-storey car park.

“This was likely to be because of some major mechanical function or repair need,” he explained. “It’s been out of action since the end of last year.

“I was perplexed officers couldn’t give me any kind of date for its return to service. Then I discovered the outage was caused mainly by anti-social behaviour.

“I was astonished by that. That has contortions of superficial damage and not major problems, but they’re assuring me the primary reason is anti-social behaviour.

“It’s not good that this town’s residents, many of whom are dependent on that lift, can’t use it because of anti-social behaviour. That’s not to mention the inconvenience of people walking by and having things thrown off the roof at them.

“This seems a good time to consider reverting to a system of having on-site attendants, which we used to have at this car park,” he added. “They maintained the car park in decent order, kept the lid on undesirable behaviour, and looked after the toilets while at it.

“I’m proposing to use the requested item procedure to get the council’s sustainable communities scrutiny committee to look at this and talk about the cost of reverting to those on site attendants.”

Councillor Owen called on the committee to press CBC officers to provide a date for the repair of the lift.

A small group of “well-known” young people are responsible, some of them from dysfunctional homes, according to Independent Leighton Linslade West councillor Victoria Harvey.

“When the lift is replaced, it will likely get broken again quickly,” she warned.

Liberal Democrat Leighton Linslade South councillor Shaun Roberts said he went up to the top deck of the car park with CBC’s director of resources, and his response was: ‘Wow, that wall is low’, so “very much concerned around the safety aspects of that”

CBC’s assistant director of public protection and transport Sue Childerhouse noted corporate resources scrutiny should be approached, as assets would be providing the security rather than the parking service.

Liberal Democrat Leighton Linslade North councillor Kevin Pughe suggested it would enable the cycle racks to be open and secure, with an attendant on site.

“We’re encouraging people to cycle, so there’d be improvements to active travel,” he said.

Councillor Harvey and Independent Barton-le-Clay and Silsoe councillor Liz Childs spoke to Bedfordshire Police and Crime Commissioner John Tizard about “pizza with cops” or any similar measures “to keep slightly lost young people occupied”.

CBC’s executive member for business, housing and public assets councillor Watkins said previously in a statement: “After anti-social behaviour at Leighton Buzzard multi-storey car park, the public lift was significantly damaged and requires full refurbishment.

“The parts required have been ordered. Once these arrive, it requires about five weeks to fit. The lift is expected to return to service in early September. We apologise for the disruption.”