Next year's carnival will be "bigger and better" says chairman, despite some calling it "disappointing"

The carnival took to the city's streets on Bank Holiday Monday after a 15 year break.

Hundreds of people lined the streets to watch a parade travel from Foregate Street to Copenhagen Street.

However, people criticised the theme of the carnival, which featured zombies and trucks full of 'body parts', as well as the lack of floats.

Writing on the Worcester Carnival Facebook page, Carla Pelz said: "Totally disappointed with the carnival. Not a float and not any entertainment, made my two year old brother scream" while Jill Leverett said: "While I do applaud the thought of having the carnival again, I was disappointed today. The kids were expecting some kind of parade and we were all surprised when it was over in less than 10 minutes.

"Both my kids were terrified of the zombies but loved the ladies with the Mexican 'Day of the Dead' painted faces. Good thought, but after travelling from Droitwich and paying an extortionate rate for parking I think it was a waste of our time."

However, Campbell Sara, said: "I so hope the people criticising are going to offer their services and now join the carnival committee so that next year's carnival will be different."

Carnival chairman, Malvin Hobbs, said that despite this, he is positive about next year's carnival.

"I've had people come up to me and say they loved it, and others saying they hated it," he said.

"But the amount of people who came out showed me one thing — that people want the carnival to return. It has to start somewhere. Yes, people are disappointed there were no floats, and so am I. I wanted floats, but the truth is we had trouble getting the bus down Copenhagen Street so floats would have been even worse.

"When it came to people expecting the fair on Pitchcroft, we had planned that too but because of the rain we had to make a choice and call it off, because the ground was far too boggy.

"I've put around £4,000 of my own money in to the carnival so of course I wanted it to be the best it could be. But over the months, several committee members dropped out and I was left with a team of three running things, meaning we couldn't reply to every email and message we got via social media from people wanting to get involved, although we wanted to.

"Initially we had a theme of celebration, but that changed and for the last few months we've been calling out for a better theme, so in the end we had to go with what we had available.

"The fact that along the way people have said to me "no one will come out", and then to see the streets absolutely packed with people, makes me feel very positive for next year and planning for next year starts next week."