Question:
Could the Executive Member explain how someone would park in a town centre car in the evening if they wanted to leave their car overnight until 8AM the next morning, without incurring a fine?
Minutes:
Could the Executive Member explain how someone would park in a town centre car in the evening if they wanted to leave their car overnight until 8am the next morning, without incurring a fine?
Answer:
Thank you, Phil, for your question.
The ticket machines have a facility to prepay for your parking either by card or cash. After you have entered your vehicle registration number you will be asked to choose a payment option.
If you are using a card than at the machine you can increase the parking period by using the + symbol. As you increase the time period the expiry time and date is displayed on the screen and also shows the amount that will be charged to your card.
For cash payments at a machine, it is slightly different. You will need to insert the amount needed to cover the additional time period. For example, should you arrive at 7pm and wish to stay until 8am the next day you would need to insert £3.50, for a car park in Wokingham.
The machines when calculating the amount will take into account the evening charge of £1 and the free overnight period which extends the stay until 6am. Anyone doing this before 10pm will not need to obtain a free vend ticket for the overnight stay, but you will need to obtain a ticket if you park after 10pm.
In addition, residents are able to purchase an overnight residents permit which enables them to park for 6pm to 8am. For an annual permit this would cost £161 which is the equivalent to 44p per evening / overnight period.
Supplementary Question:
May I say thank you to the Member for his answer. It reminds me of a Monty Python sketch about moving your coat to a lower peg before lunch, after you have moved your shoes to a different cupboard. I have pictures of bleary-eyed travellers staying in the Premier Inn or wherever, making their way to the car parks in order to pay the ticket for the morning, and that is what drove this question. However, what has further driven my question and my supplementary, is the confusion for the Members in this very Chamber about how they would deal with parking in the car park in order to attend this meeting, which included many, many back and forth conversations with officers in the Council, as you will know as I think some of our Lib Dem friends were involved in them.
So, my question is can you please consider, and ask your Officers to consider, making the rules simpler and making the signage clearer, and written in plain English so that people know what is expected of them so that they do not get a fine for parking incorrectly.
Supplementary Answer:
The signs on site are in plain English. It is £1 for the evening charge in Wokingham, and that allows you to park from 6pm through to 10pm. If you want to extend your stay it allows you when you put your registration you press the button and you see the + sign come up, and it says ‘additional time’. All that information is there.