The mood at last week's open meeting held by Tenby Walled Town Residents' Association (TWTRA) was overwhelmingly against the imposition of this year's extended traffic scheme. The meeting voted unanimously to reject the council's traffic orders.
Speaker after speaker who had suffered hardship as a result of last year's experiment predicted greater hardship this year. Many also expressed their frustration at the county council's attitude to their complaints.
"It would appear that the official policy towards those who have genuine objections to the scheme is merely to 'note' their comments," said Richard Walker, chairman of TWTRA. "There's never any engagement with the issues.
"I would, though, still urge anyone who has a problem with the proposed scheme to write to Huw Roberts at the County Council in Haverfordwest. Everyone has until the 12th (next Monday) to lodge their 'objections to the order'. Eventually there'll come a tipping point where 'noting' won't be enough and they'll have to react some other way."
The meeting voted to set up a fighting fund so that if the county council is forced, due to the weight of the objections, into a public inquiry or a legal challenge there will be money to pay for further expert advice. Several hundred pounds were immediately pledged.
Richard Walker added: "Since the meeting we've heard back from the council on the issue of free parking for those walled town residents who have off-street parking. Their initial response to the news that there are over 180 off-street parking spaces is to offer 20 spaces in each of the three car parks for the duration of the scheme. We can't see how this solves anything, unless we're supposed to stack cars on top of each other.
'Clr. Mickey Folland's workable permit scheme would be a better solution, but presumably this has simply been 'noted'.
"One other irony emerged this week. Huw Roberts, the PCC's director of transport, and the architect of the pedestrianisation scheme, is off to pastures new. So the man who said he had all the answers to Tenby's traffic problems, won't even be around to be asked."