A councillor has called for an end to car park chaos at the Great Northern Retail Park in Huddersfield.

Works to re-model the junction of Lower Fitzwilliam Street and the A62 Leeds Road, as part of the A62 Smart Corridor scheme, was originally intended to end gridlock for cars leaving the retail park.

But as work was completed, Kirklees Council admitted that the changes – which included a new entrance in front of the Tui store – wouldn’t solve the problem of exit queues at peak times unless the layout of the car park was altered.

The car park is in private ownership and the owners had no plans to change the layout.

Mirfield Tory councillor Martyn Bolt paid a visit to the retail park on Christmas Eve and he was left queuing for almost half-an-hour to leave the car park.

“At first it didn’t look too bad,” he said. “But in about 15 minutes I got about five yards. Cars were trying to force their way into the queue and people were starting to lose the spirit of Christmas.

“It was a fiasco and there seems to be little difference in the layout. The parking area to the left of the exit road is closed off and therefore could easily have been altered so the two exit lanes extend much further and feed traffic out.

“Why has public money been spent on a new entrance from Lower Fitzwilliam Street and all these junction works when they couldn’t sort out the problem with whoever owns the car park?

“As this is one of a number of retail park layouts approved by Kirklees Council they must bear some responsibility.”

A62 roads scheme and new access ‘won’t end car park gridlock’ at Great Northern Retail Park