carmarthen.tv

Finally got round to going into the new super-Tesco just before Christmas. Probably was not the best time to go; it was difficult to park and packed with people, but on the other hand there was a choir singing outside and a lady was handing out Quality Street at the door.

It’s pretty much identical to the Tesco Extra in Llanelli. I image that all Tesco Extras are built to a ‘template’ to avoid the cost of custom designing every store.

Actually there is one difference — the organic products are mixed around the store with their non-organic cousins whereas in Llanelli there is an ‘Organic’ shelf at the back of the store.

Shortly after Christmas the charge to park your car in St Peters car park or the one behind M&S went up to £1 for two hours. This is far too much. They should be making car parking cheaper, not more expensive if they want to make it attractive for people to go into the town centre to shop.

But that’s not the most annoying thing; it’s the fact that you have to enter the numbers from your car registration into the ticket machine. The ticket is then linked to your car, the idea being to prevent you from giving your ticket to someone so they can use your unused parking time.

That’s just wrong. I hate shopping and would never spend two hours in town. If I want to give my ticket to someone in my family or even a random stranger then what is that to the council? I could stay in the car park for the full two hours and it would come to the same thing. The council can’t stop people giving up their unused time. If I want to give my ticket away it’s none of their business.

The revamped food section of Marks and Spencer Carmarthen is amazing. Classy black shelving, a better layout and generally looking cool.

I heard on Radio Carmarthenshire this week that the residents of the surrounding streets are taking their case to the High Court. They want a public vote on whether St Catherine Street should be closed. The council says it would be illegal to offer a public vote.

For those unaware, the plan is to redevelop part of the town centre with a cinema multiplex and a Debenhams store and to close St Catherine Street, a fairly busy road through the area. People living in nearby streets are afraid that traffic will be forced down their residential roads instead.

Tesco Extra is coming to Carmarthen — a new store is about to be built at Five Fields, not too far from the current store. It’ll have 87,000 sq. feet of floor space. If you want to see the store I’ve found this floor plan at the developer’s website.

I’ve been reading about the case of TV boss Dafydd Evans. Not to make light of it, but what a story. This just reads like a certain fugitive-themed movie. It’s the case of the man, who went on the run after a road accident at a junction near Llandeilo. A police helicopter and sniffer dogs couldn’t locate him as he wandered the fields overnight. When he appeared the next day he said he had been in a daze, and hadn’t been trying to escape. He’s been sentenced to three years.

It’s been snowing in Carmarthen sporadically over the last week. The days of 28th February and 1st March were the whitest but no MAJOR snowfall. It’s over now though and actually starting to warm up. Up to a dizzy 9 degrees today.