A father has described how a shopping trip with family turned into the day out from hell after they became stuck in a shopping center car park.
Paul Hampton, 49, has vowed never to return to the city again after spending hours trapped in the multi-storey car park at the Orchards Shopping Centre in Coventry.
Paul spoke of some shoppers giving up all hope after waiting for more than five hours, abandoning their cars with parents leaving their vehicles in order to feed children.
Paul, who lives in nearby Bedworth said he popped in for a quick trip to the shopping center with his daughter and some lunch, but ended up spending most of the day stuck in traffic trying to leave the car park, CoventryLive reports.
“We went in thinking it would be really quick. We parked up, dropped my daughter off, had some lunch, came back and then we sat in the car for three and a half hours on the fifth floor of the car park.”
He added: “It basically ruined the whole day because he had other plans to do, which obviously we did not achieve. We had to do everything on Sunday (October 9) so we pretty much lost a day.”
Paul said other shoppers had been waiting around five hours to exit the car park. He said: “Some people gave up after five hours, they just abandoned the cars. We were told that if we had an appointment and were going to miss, to leave the car and go off to the appointment.”
Parents were also seen taking to their children to get food having not anticipated the huge queues, he said. Paul said: “People were leaving the driver there sitting in traffic while they went and fed their children because obviously, they did not expect to be there for that long.”
Paul has vowed not to return to the city centre and will instead drive to nearby cities to avoid the nightmare experience happening again. He said: “I will not go shopping at all again in Coventry. I will drive to Birmingham where I know I can park and get out at a decent time. I will take my money elsewhere.”
Paul contacted West Orchards Shopping Centre who he said blamed Coventry City Council for the delays.
A spokesman for Coventry City Council said the delays were due to nearby roadworks.
