Visitors to Shrewsbury's Quary park down by 425,000 - with weather blamed as major factor
Visits to a popular Shrewsbury town centre park were down by around 425,000 last year, according to a report.
There were 840,000 visits to the Quarry in 2023, down from 1.26 million in 2022.
That is according to a footfall report by Shrewsbury Town Council's acting operations manager Stuart Farmer, which was prepared to go before the authority's recreation and leisure committee this week.
According to the report, 1.35m visits were made to the park in 2019. Figures were not included from 2020 and 2021 due to disruption from the Covid pandemic, when most of the Quarry's major festivals and events had to be cancelled.
Last year's lower figures were put down to worse weather in both summer and winter.
The report said: "Quarry visitors have remained stable during November and December but are down on previous year’s numbers. It is worth mentioning that is focusing solely on the Quarry and does not include the counters in the Square or Market Hall. It should also be noted that summer 2023 was not as warm and dry as summer 2022, which has been reflected in footfall numbers.
"The very wet winter period covering October and November will go some way to explaining why figures are lower for this year. This has included the cancellation of the Saturday parkruns, although the Christmas Day [run] did take place. It is expected that visitor numbers will increase throughout the summer of 2024."
The report added: "The counters that are located in the Market Hall and the Square are currently being investigated by the supplier due to intermittent power failures. The figures have not been included in this report as the data is incomplete."
