A Westhoughton restaurant owner has spoken out about his "hard decision" to start charging for parking as he faced having to close his doors. Abdul Atique, who owns and manages the Mangrove Restaurant and Takeaway on Manchester Road, said sometimes staff would arrive for work to find the car park full – leaving them having to park on the surrounding side roads instead. As of Thursday, June 27, those looking to park in the restaurant’s car park will need to enter their number plate inside in order to park for free.
Those not dining at the restaurant will still be able to park, but will be charged £1 an hour, or £5 for seven hours. Sign up to our newsletters to get the latest stories sent straight to your inbox. Abdul, who took over the business in 2020, said: “People were abusing the car park like crazy.
We were getting a lot of problems with our customers- when they came into the restaurant they didn’t find parking spaces. “A lot of the time customers were just leaving because they can’t find parking spaces. “We’ve never had a problem with people parking from 7am until 5pm.
After 5pm, when we open our restaurant, it’s required for our customers. Follow The Bolton News on Facebook , Instagram , X (Twitter) , and TikTok . “I’ve been putting notices up requesting people not to park there after 5pm, but people just park in our car park and they just go elsewhere and leave their car there for hours.
“Sometimes we don’t even get a parking space when we c.
