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SHOCK: Denton Market stallholders Ken and Barbara Holt say they are ‘gobsmacked’ by the decision to close it
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Gloomy new year for axed market
Sue Carr27/12/2006
COUNCIL bosses have sent a miserly message to Denton market traders: shut down your stalls after Christmas.
The failing market will cease trading on Friday, 12 January, after Tameside Council decided to turn the ground into a civic square.
Although the redevelopment was announced at a district assembly meeting in early November, traders say they only found out they would lose their pitches in a letter received two weeks ago.
Barbara and Ken Holt have run a greetings card stall on the market for 20 years and say they were "absolutely gobsmacked".
"We were of the understanding that they were going to have a row of portable stalls at the back of the cabins to put up and take down as they needed them," she said.
"We thought they would be ideal, but the council has apparently decided they're too expensive. We were never formally told anything."
The couple have now moved to Hyde market on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Barbara added: "It's very sad because the people of Denton are fantastic. We just want to say thank you to them for the trade we have had over the past 20 years and for the friendship."
The council's head of markets, Ian Kelly, said portable stalls were too expensive. The five kiosks will remain although he said he could not guarantee their future. The council is also in talks to find an alternative site for the Sunday car boot sale.
"Sadly, the reality is that the current outdoor market at Denton has been commercially unviable for several years," he said. "We have supported the market with a series of initiatives in recent times, but our markets are intended to be self-supporting and it is not realistic to use council taxpayers' money to prop up an operation which is winning a smaller and smaller share of Denton shoppers' spending."
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29/12/2006 at 14:57
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