Organisers of the Bingley Show have turned down a last-ditch offer to save the event and hold it at another venue.
The Telegraph & Argus reported in later editions yesterday how the Airedale Agricultural Society decided to cancel the show - due to go ahead in three weeks on August 7 - after an access row with residents. And Bradford Council stepped in to offer Myrtle Park as a new venue - where the event was previously held for more than a century.
But today show publicity officer Teddy Wright said there was not enough time to re-organise everything.
"We are delighted that the Council got involved so quickly and that they have taken an interest but we feel we couldn't re-arrange everything at such short notice," he said. "We wouldn't be able to put on the kind of show we wanted in such a short time without there being any hiccups."
The cancellation means the show will lose about £20,000.
Councillor Anne Hawkes-worth, the Council's executive member for the environment, said: "We will meet the show committee members to discuss the future of the event and we would welcome Bingley Show back to Myrtle Park with open arms."
Organisers planned to use Aire View Avenue, off the A65 Bradford Road, as an access to the Bradford and Bingley Sports Ground for wagons and horse boxes. Angry residents said they were never consulted.
The show controversially moved to the sports ground in Wagon Lane in 2000 after safety concerns and parking problems around Myrtle Park. Last year it was cancelled because of the foot-and-mouth epidemic.
Butcher Darren Todd, a member of the town's chamber of commerce who has three shops in Chapel Lane, said he was disappointed to see the popular event cancelled. "I hope it will be back at Myrtle Park next year because if not it will be another nail in the coffin for Bingley," he said.
"When the show was at the park, traders did very well and we would all like to see it moved up here again. I understand it would have been a big job for the organisers to change venue and I'm not knocking them for that decision."
Councillor David Heseltine said: "We bent over backwards to try to help keep the show on but the organisers obviously don't have as much enthusiasm as we do. I can't understand why it's taken the organisers to this late stage to realise there's an access problem. If they'd come to the Council sooner we would have been able to offer them Myrtle Park earlier."
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