Bathgate could see a weekly street market return for the first time in three years next month, at a new venue and in a regular Saturday morning slot.
Local businesswoman Lucy Lawson, who runs Unicorn Markets, hopes to gain licences for the new market after securing agreement for a site in the Gardners Lane car park, close to the site of the original marketplace, where the new Lidl store is.
She plans the new Saturday market will run between 9.30am and 2.30pm, with spaces for 40 stalls and 30 car boot sale pitches.
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And she hopes it will be the start of a new era in outdoor markets which could expand into Livingston.
Lucy told the Local Democracy Reporting Service “I’m really excited. I have been working on the plans since October. Getting the location has been the difficult part.”
She hopes the new market will attract a wide range of traders similar to the town’s once popular Friday market and, like that regular event, prove to be a magnet for shoppers bringing in people as a place to meet friends.
The market’s Facebook page says: “There will be old favourites from your fruit and veg stall to your butchers and fish vans, pet supplies, fabric stalls, jewellery stalls, baby clothing and also a range of more modern stalls such as craft stalls and wax melts stalls. Of course there will be doughnuts too!
Lucy believes that the popularity of outdoor shopping has been boosted by Covid and added that she has been overwhelmed by the public support that she has received from people in Bathgate, as well as community groups and the town’s community council.
"I really want the market to be a community hub and a value led company," said Lucy
In the longer term Lucy hopes to establish a second outdoor market within Livingston’s central shopping area.
She hopes to be able to get the Bathgate operation up and running in early August to have it as a regular Saturday morning draw to the town before the winter sets in.
The town’s original street market run by Spook Erections was popular in its Whitburn Road site - originally the town’s horse market- until the early 2000’s. By 2019 the market had moved to the Steelyard and rarely had more than one or two traders.
It finally ceased at the end of 2019 when all four local councillors opposed renewed licence for the traders because of the damage being done to the refurbished Steelyard site by heavy vehicles parking in what is now a pedestrian zone.
A West Lothian Council spokesperson said: “Council officers have been involved in initial discussions with a third party around the possibility of a market type operation in Bathgate.
“There are a number of statutory requirements that would need to be completed before this could commence, and we have offered practical and technical advice on the steps required in the process.”
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