70 vehicles turn out for Dorset car meet for mental health
The meet in a Blandford car park was for 'Motors for Mind'
A car-meet raising awareness of mental health saw 70 cars turned up at Tesco's car park in Blandford.
The 'Motors for Mind' event was announced only hours before it took place on Saturday evening.
Dorset Police commented the meet was 'good natured' with a strict policy in place regarding anti-social behaviour.
It had been put together by a collection of car groups, including DT11 MODIFIED, Southern Automotive and Sunrise Automotive.
The event was aimed at raising money and awareness for Mind, the mental health charity.
Louisa Farrow is one of the organisers. She said:
"No one knew, we managed to keep it undercover until we launched. Everyone has a passion and I think the people who came have realised this is what could be something that is extraordinarily big for something that is a very good cause.
"We wanted to get some positive into the car scene again. We have a lot of, obviously, some bad publicity and we wanted to raise money for the charity and we thought this was the best way we could do it - to get fun spirit, fun gatherings, back into what we do as car enthusiasts."
Louisa says they hadn't intended for this to be a big event. She said:
"It was absolutely totally overwhelming, the support we got within the car community. It was overwhelming but extremely positive at the same time."
It's part of a series of events planned for the whole year under the 'Motors for Mind' banner.
You can find out more on their social media pages.
A spokesperson for Dorset Police said:
"The meet was all good natured with organisers having a strict policy in place regarding anti social behaviour/driving at these events. This was good to see.
"We can report only one vehicle received a ticket - leaving the car park anti socially, witnessed by officers in the car park with a unit waiting outside where it was stopped and received a section 59 notice."