SHOPPERS narrowly escaped serious injury this week when a parked car rolled down Market Street and through a store window, because the owner had forgotten to put the handbrake on. It is the second time in as many months that an accident like this has happened on the one-way street. But again, miraculously, no one was hurt. The black Audi estate was parked outside Kellaway Barbers at around 9-40 am on Wednesday, when it began rolling backwards. Veering diagonally across the street and picking up speed, it knocked over one metal bollard before becoming wedged between a second and the recently-shut-down Touch of Glass store, which has apparently just been re-leased. The large single window fronting the empty store was shattered and the aluminium frame bent, possibly because one of the car's rear wheels mounted the shop floor. A fire engine and a police car were on the scene promptly, aiding in the clean-up of glass and debris, and directing traffic around the area. The owner of the car, a woman apparently out shopping, was said to be extremely distressed by the incident. She was consoled in a nearby shop for the duration of the clean-up operation. Local resident Arthur Hitchcock saw the accident occur from the window of his shop, Light and Day, on Market Street. "I was fixing something and I looked up and thought, 'there's no one driving that car'," he said. Mr Hitchcock said that accidents such as this "nearly" occur on a "weekly" basis. "Either people are driving down the road the wrong way," he said, "or cars are rolling back, generally with people in them, trying to get control." Around two months ago, his shop was struck in a similar, if less destructive, incident. A woman had parked her Ford Escort at the same spot on Market Street before entering the newsagents. The vehicle's handbrake was left off and the car ended up crashing into the side of Mr Hitchcock's shop, gouging a window sill.
