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Published on 14th September 2006 in News

Roadworks threatened the recent Howden Heritage Weekend when areas of the town became inaccessible - and it looks as though the same problem could continue during the forthcoming Howden Festival.

One Howden resident described Market Place and Pinfold Street as "noisy, dusty and inaccessible" at the weekend when CE Electric UK closed off and dug up sections of the road for maintenance to the electricity supply. Work is set to continue on Sundays for at least the next two weeks.

The work comes at an unfortunate time, as the annual Howden Festival will be running for the following two weekends, and residents say the works are causing chaos at a time when Howden needs to look its best.

However, a spokesperson for the East Riding of Yorkshire Council this week told this newspaper that the relevant council department was not informed about the events in enough time to delay the work.

The spokesperson said: "There is a mechanism where the officers who process road closures are automatically notified of forthcoming events on the highway, when those events have required a licence. Large-scale events which are not on the highway but may have implications for the highway are also passed on to the road closure team.

"These departments were not made aware of the Heritage Weekend or of Howden Festival by the organisers of the events."

Ann Walker, customer liaison with CE Electric UK, added: "Although we have just been made aware of the forthcoming Howden Festival, we have visited the booking office and found out about the programme of events, including the venues and timings.

"We do not consider that our road closure or well-signed diversions are close enough to the festival venues to cause any problems.

"We want to assure Howden residents that we will be working to complete the essential work as quickly as possible."