{"id":344070,"date":"2025-08-14T14:30:19","date_gmt":"2025-08-14T14:30:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/344070\/"},"modified":"2025-08-14T14:30:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-14T14:30:19","slug":"police-warn-traffic-diversions-in-place-for-belfast-mela-parade-this-weekend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/344070\/","title":{"rendered":"Police warn traffic diversions in place for Belfast Mela parade this weekend"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Traffic<\/p>\n

Traffic diversions will be in place for the MELA carnival (Kelvin Boyes\/Press Eye\/PA)<\/p>\n

Police have warned there may be traffic disruption in Belfast with the multi-cultural Mela Carnival<\/a> making its way through the city this Saturday.<\/p>\n

The carnival \u2013 which marks the start of the diverse cultural celebrations \u2013 will assemble around Writers Square at noon, before following a route through the city at 12.30pm.<\/p>\n

Revellers will make their way from the square to Waring Street, Bridge Street, Castle Place, Donegall Place and then into the grounds of the city hall.<\/p>\n

Police said the parade will disperse at approximately 1pm.<\/p>\n

Motorists\u2019 access will be restricted along the parade route as it takes place.<\/p>\n

To accommodate this, Hill Street will be closed between 1.30pm and 3.15pm.<\/p>\n

Last month the 19th Belfast Mela was officially opened at Tetto \u2013 the Bullitt Hotel\u2019s rooftop restaurant \u2013 by Lord Mayor Tracy Kelly and Economy Minister Dr Caoimhe Archibald.<\/p>\n

The event opened with a performance by Kenyan-born musician Njambi, as well as a cross-cultural dance performed by the South Asian Dance Academy and Irish Entertainment Group.<\/p>\n

Last year\u2019s 18th annual Mela saw almost 60,000 people turned up for the festivities.<\/p>\n

This year will see events taking place up until August 24, celebrating diversity through food, dance, music and other cultural practices.<\/p>\n

\"Traffic<\/p>\n

Traffic diversions will be in place for the MELA carnival (Kelvin Boyes\/Press Eye\/PA)<\/p>\n

Belfast History Explained: Who was Mary Ann McCracken?<\/p>\n

The disruption with the Mela parade also comes on the same weekend as the M3 is scheduled to be closed from Bridge End to the M2 Foreshore over the weekend. Traffic will be diverted through the city centre.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis will cause additional delays, and we would strongly advise all motorists to plan in advance leaving additional time for their journey,\u201d a PSNI spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease seek an alternative route where possible.<\/p>\n

\u201cPolice will have an appropriate and proportionate policing operation in place to ensure the safety of all.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Traffic diversions will be in place for the MELA carnival (Kelvin Boyes\/Press Eye\/PA) Police have warned there may…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":344071,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5011],"tags":[2378,122257,1144,1610,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-344070","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-northern-ireland","8":"tag-belfast","9":"tag-belfast-mela","10":"tag-northern-ireland","11":"tag-police-service-of-northern-ireland","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115027602733095742","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344070","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344070"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344070\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344071"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344070"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344070"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344070"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}