IT’S become a staple gag at Bournemouth’s pantomime – sending the villain to Castlepoint car park where it’s impossible to escape.

But the panto scriptwriters may need some new material this year as Castlepoint bosses are quietly confident that the worst of their traffic problems are behind them.

Fed up with the length of time it sometimes took motorists to exit the shopping park at the B&Q end, manager Peter Matthews asked the council to help them think of a solution.

Their recommendation was to alter the traffic light trigger in Castlepoint’s Hamblin Way last November and the results have been noticeable.

Castlepoint has since made it through a busy Christmas and January sales period without a single ‘Code Blue’ situation – their term for the crippling queues that required marshalling by staff.

“It’s been the first year ever that has happened,” said general manager Peter Matthews.

“We had 20,800 cars here on the Friday before Christmas and 123,000 cars in the week before Christmas and we had no queues either up the Asda ramp or underneath at B&Q or Sainsbury’s.

“We’d anticipated having staff on Code Blue duty every day in the week before Christmas and the week after Christmas but it wasn’t needed.

“We’ve been full on several occasions but there have been no major problems with cars getting out.

“The general consensus is that it is much better than it used to be.

“It’s the Saturdays that used to be really bad but I’ve not seen a really long queue on a Saturday since the traffic light system was changed.”

Ian Kalra, transportation services manager at the council, said: “The council is pleased to hear that problems of traffic exiting Castlepoint have been greatly reduced as a result of these works.

“In finding a solution we have been very careful to ensure that we did not disadvantage users of Castle Lane West especially at peak periods.”

• A failure in Bournemouth’s traffic light hardware system on Saturday saw the Castlepoint lights reverted to a shorter circuit and caused delays with shoppers exiting the car park.