The suggestion the Colchester High Street market should be moved into the old Co-op building is the be welcomed (Gazette Letters, March 8).
What we have now cannot be considered a proper market. On Saturday last it consisted of a number of street food stalls sandwiched between a greengrocer and an ironmonger.
While the food stalls are obviously very popular we can surely do better than this.
An indoor market on the lines of that in Chelmsford would be a great asset and would, it is to be hoped, draw people to a rather run down area of the town.
The pitch fees would need to be carefully set. Those applicable for the High Street are £29.10 per pitch per day plus £1.10 for electricity hook-up. Compare this with as low as £18.28 for Chelmsford market (cheaper on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday).
The lower fees obviously attract a wider range of stallholders judging by those selling at Chelmsford.
The stallholders didn't want to move from Culver Street to High Street and a 10,000 plus petition against the move indicated what the public thought of the idea.
We lost some very good stalls at the time of the move (including the magazine seller) and more seem to have gone since.
Any new location should include street food since these traders are obviously providing a good range of food products.
Norman Bailey
Cambridge Road, Colchester
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