Businesses say the road works have come at the worst time

The A483 road north of Llanbadarn Fynydd in Powys has been closed until the beginning of September for vital repairs.

It follows several years of temporary traffic lights halting motorists on a stretch of the road.

Motorists travelling across Wales are being forced to divert miles around the A470 because of the road works.

The Welsh assembly says the school holidays were chosen as the best time to carry out the repairs, but business people and politicians in nearby communities disagree.

"Everybody is agreed the work needs to be done, and I am quite prepared to put up with the inconvenience, but not in August which is our business month," said Derek Law, mayor of Llandrindod Wells.

The town's Victorian Festival - an eight day extravaganza - takes place in mid August, and the National Eisteddfod is being staged in Meifod near Welshpool next week.

"There is no doubt that people who have planned to come will still do so, but road works like this are bound to put the casual visitor off."

There are fears the Victorian Festival in Llandrindod Wells could be hit

Brecon and Radnor MP Roger Williams said the road closure was hitting tourism hard.

"Businesses do about 70% of their trade between the last week of July and September -and these are people who were badly hit by foot-and-mouth two years ago."

Trish Armstrong, landlady of the New Inn at Llanbadarn Fynydd, said they had invested heavily in the business after the epidemic, and now they would not be able to benefit from that investment.

"At the moment all the traffic has been re-routed so that they're passing Llandrindod and the economy of the whole valley will suffer and our concerns are completely ignored.

Signposted

"The assembly has only had one consultation with the community council and local business needs have been ignored," she said.

"They said that if they didn't do the repair work now then it wouldn't be done at all.

Welsh Economic Development minister Andrew Davies met some local people to discuss the road closure, while visiting Llanidloes on Wednesday.

After the meeting, an assembly spokesman said it had been agreed that a local diversion - along an unclassified road from Llanbadarn Fynydd - would be signposted to attract more traffic while the road repairs are carried out.