Driving test centre to close

Oct 16 2008 by Richard Evans, North Wales Weekly News

LEARNER drivers will have to travel out of Conwy county to sit their test when a centre closes in Rhos-on-Sea in December.

The Driving Standards Agency will leave the site at Dinerth Road on December 19, forcing learners to travel to Rhyl or Bangor.

The decision has met with outrage, with driving instructors claiming learners in Conwy will be at a disadvantage paying more to travel to the test centre and then having to use unfamiliar roads.

The centre in Rhos-on-Sea, which hosts 3,500 tests a year, is on a site shared with the Welsh Assembly which is moving out once its new offices on the old Hotpoint site in Llandudno Junction are complete.

Frank Price of the Dulas School of Motoring, a driving instructor for 30 years and chairman of North Wales Driving Instructors’ Association, is furious about the decision.

“It’s not looking after the public. It won’t affect the instructors, but the pupils will have to travel to Rhyl to become familiar with the area,” he said.

Learner driver Bethan Huws, 17, of Old Colwyn, said: “I think it is really bad. It means if I don’t pass I will have to go to Bangor. It is too far away and I won’t be used to those roads.”

Rhos-on-Sea councillor and Colwyn Bay mayor Phil Edwards said: “It is very sad news for this area.”

A spokesman for the DSA said Rhyl is 12 miles from Colwyn Bay, well within the 30-mile criterion. Bangor is about 20 miles away.

“Operationally, both centres meet the agency’s requirements in terms of test routes and have the spare capacity to absorb the demand for tests diverted from the Colwyn Bay area,” he said.

“The closure date for the Colwyn Bay centre was decided taking into consideration tests that had already been booked.”