image credit: Christine Racher, Vehicles of Yesteryear 2017
Pevensey Parish Council has confirmed today (January 30) to Bay Life that the Vehicles of Yesteryear annual event, the popular Pevensey Bay homegrown ‘mini-festival for a day’, is to go ahead this April.
Questions about the status of the event have been raised, following the confirmation that Wealden Council is to take full control over the management of the site, with all monies raised going to the local authority (Pevensey Bay Journal, edition 31, Saturday 25 January).
The event draws up to 1,000 people every year. Many of these people are known to be visitors for the day. For the First time this year, an ‘audit’ of the day is to take place in a number of local food establishments to test the ‘value of the day’ to the business community in terms of the visitor footprint.
The information is to be utilised as part of a campaign that will launch this May titled “Seize the Community Day, Save the Sea Road Car Park”.
The campaign is being launched by a group of local residents, with support from a number of local businesses.. The campaign will look at a number of long term questions about the future of the Sea Road Car Park, questions that are of vital interest to Pevensey Bay as a visitor destination.
What for example is to happen to the Information Centre? No-one appears to know.
One focus for the campaign will be the promotion of the site, as a family base of community events, with up to six community based events on the site through the calendar year proposed..
One of the people associated with the campaign, who has significant local organising experience, told Bay Life that she was ‘gagging to have a go” at organising community events on the site..
Net proceeds from such events could go to Pevensey Parish Council, to support the work of the cash strapped organisation.
Such monies, ring fenced in some way to support a ‘Seize the Community Day: Friends of the Sea Road Car Park” endeavour could be established to promote community days each year such as the Vehicles of Yesteryear event.
With a new state-of-the art web platform, and active local press print promotion, such a new endeavour could reach a wider audience.
Checking out the new web platform to see dates and times of the next community event at the site. could become a routine online feature of searches on the local net. As well as details of the winners at the classic car show from the previous year, what could be detailed could be news about the site and details of the next event on the community calendar.
As well as classic cars we could be seeing some other classic community events coming to the Sea Road Car Park.
Further details about the Vehicles of Yesteryear event, including the date and more information for classic car owners, as well as stallholder forms. will be available in the coming days from Pevensey Parish Council.
Bay Life will publish full details of the Day when made available.
Community and local business input into what happens at the Sea Road Car Park is vital to the preservation and development of our visitor footprint.
Wealden Council told the Pevensey Bay Journal, “the Council has decided to take over the management of Sea Road Car park in Pevensey and The Willows car park in Alfriston to provide a consistent management approach across its 36 car parks. Sea Road car park will continue to be available for a range of community events which bring visitors to Pevensey”.
