The sandbags are being removed from Bishopthorpe Road in York.
Just over a week after City of York Council shocked the street by installing two huge sandbags outside Q Gentlemen’s Barbers, officials are changing tack.
The blockade was created after the council ordered the barbershop to shut.
This followed numerous breaches of Covid regulations. Business owners had been issued with 12 fixed penalty notices, with fines totalling £33,000.
They then flouted two orders to close the barbers.
After the business was raided by police and council enforcement officers and shut down, the owners attempted to get back in.
And that’s when the two large containers of builders sand were installed in the doorway.
Repeatedly targeted
But the blockade was repeatedly targeted. Someone put up a ‘free sand’ post on Facebook and sign in the shop window, and by Monday one bag had gone completely.
The council wouldn’t comment on these actions. But it did say the days of the sandbags were over.
Matt Boxall, the head of public protection at City of York Council, told YorkMix: “The sandbags outside Q Gentleman’s Barbers were a short-term, immediate measure to prevent immediate access by the public.
“As other safeguards have now been put in place, we are now making arrangements for the last sandbags to be removed from the area.”
They haven’t responded to questions over what the new safeguards are.