MORE public seats could be provided in and around Wellington’s town centre in an initiative being proposed by town councillor John Thorne.

Cllr Thorne wants to see more benches provided for people to sit on if they need to rest while shopping and walking to and from the centre of town.

He has agreed to map out existing public seats and also potential sites for new ones to enable the town council’s environment committee to look at how to take the plan forward.

Cllr Thorne has asked the committee to recommend a rolling budget to provide a number of new seats each year until the council feels there are enough.

He said: “It started when a friend who has walking difficulties mentioned there were few seats in the town centre for him to sit and rest when he was shopping.

“So, I had a look around and realised we only have the seats in front of the old post office, the Co-operative supermarket and the United Reformed Church, which is not very much.

“When you think further afield, there are seats in the garden area at the top of North Street and near the top of Hillyhead.

“There used to be more but it seems some have been lost over the past several years.

“Now, if you were walking, for instance, from Tonedale or Cades Farm, or the Barn Meads Road area, you would be hard pushed to find somewhere to sit down en route.

“If we want to encourage more people to walk more as part of an active and healthy lifestyle, then providing public seating is clearly going to help.”

Cllr Thorne said there would be cost implications and issues such as land ownership and highways authority consents to negotiate once the mapping exercise was completed.

“It is unlikely we are going to be able to afford to provide all the seats we want in one go, so it is more likely the council will need to do one or two each year,” he said.