Some people reported waiting for nearly four hours before they managed to leave the car park
Cars waiting to leave Cabot Circus, with some sat for as many as three hours(Image: Arron Howe)
Queues to get out of Cabot Circus car park in Bristol left one woman screaming “we just wanna go home”.
More shoppers have shared their frustration at getting stuck inside the Cabot Circus car park for almost four hours on Saturday afternoon (Nov 15) following a reported fault with traffic lights outside the shopping centre.
Taking to TikTok, one woman said she had been waiting for around half an hour but a man in front of her car had been there for an hour and a half.
“Right, we’re here,” she began. “There’s like queues and queues of cars. People are coming out now – we’ve been here half an hour. I’ve just been talking to a guy, he’s in front of me, he’s been here an hour and a half.
“Apparently something is going on. A lady has called the police, the police can’t help. She’s called security, she’s even called the place who owns this car park and they ain’t answering the phone!
“We just wanna to home,” she exclaimed before screaming at the camera.
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“I’ve just been informed that it’s because the new Marks and Spensers has opened so. Loads and loads of traffic. People are here absolutely in an uproar. It’s not on.”
On Saturday, multiple drivers and their passengers contacted BristolLive about their long afternoon spent sightseeing inside Cabot Circus car park.
It’s understood that traffic lights around Cabot Circus went down on Saturday afternoon which, when combined with Saturday afternoon traffic, the opening of Bristol’s Christmas Market for the festive season and Redcliffe road closures brought on by a protest, created an afternoon of chaos in the city centre.
Arron Howe, who was stuck in his car for an hour and a half after returning to the car park at 6pm, told BristolLive he was one of the fortunate ones.
“I think they were clearing it one level at a time and being on level eight, it was the short straw,” he said. “A woman with a baby in front of me said they’d been waiting for nearly four hours.”
He added: “It was just the lack of information that was odd. No-one came to explain what was happening.”
Arron mentioned that his partner experienced delays while shopping last weekend, though not quite as severe. He fears the traffic issues will only escalate in the run-up to Christmas.
“It was really busy in the town centre,” he added. “We were quite lucky. We got back just before 6pm and we were there about an hour and a half.”
Multiple motorists reported that Cabot Circus security personnel attempted to manage traffic flow on the lower levels, but those parked on the upper floors claim they received little to no information about the situation.
Another stranded driver, who first attempted to exit the car park at 2.40pm, said: “We were on the 8th floor and nobody has told us anything. It looks like security are on lower floors trying to control traffic but we’ve heard they only have one barrier open to leave the car park since.”
She later provided an update, saying: “We have finally got to the barriers. In the three hours and 30 minutes we have been stuck here we only started moving in the last 30 minutes with no communication from anyone in the car park who works here.
“All the barriers are open but it looks like it’s caused from the traffic in the city centre. We aren’t from Bristol and have come to go shopping but definitely won’t be coming again!!”