Aldi car park

I have had a lot of complaints from residents regarding anti-social behaviour on Aldi car park in the centre of Ashton. As a result of these complaints I held a meeting with representatives of the police, local residents, Wigan Council and young people who use the area to skateboard.

One of the problems with this area is that it is private property which belongs to Aldi so the police have few powers to stop this behaviour although they do move large groups of young people on. At the meeting various suggestions were made to put a stop to the behaviour which is so upsetting local residents. These included a request to Aldi management to turn off a light that is on during the day and night, a request to the the security personnel to also move the young people on more frequently. A suggestion was made to fence off the area but this would have been far too expensive and impractical.


I was very impressed with the attitude of the skateboarders present. They clearly did not want to cause annoyance to local residents and were very amenable to suggestions made by local residents including finishing their activities in the early evening. Unfortunately as usual it was other less responsible young people who were causing the problems.

One of the main issues that came from the meeting was that there was nowhere for young people in Ashton to skateboard - see above article