What do you think about this?

S

Shelter

Guest
Im sure everyone has an opinion on the article in the Express & Star tonight.

Stafford council admits there is not enough car parking spaces around stafford. They are going to look into it!
Part of the article mentions charging for car parking in the town in the evenings and sundays!!

dont bother to put your Answers on a postcard please lol, just leave them here.
 

Jade-clothing

Well-Known Forumite
Shelter said:
Im sure everyone has an opinion on the article in the Express & Star tonight.

Stafford council admits there is not enough car parking spaces around stafford. They are going to look into it!
Part of the article mentions charging for car parking in the town in the evenings and sundays!!

dont bother to put your Answers on a postcard please lol, just leave them here.
I had an email yesterday from the town centre development officer with a link to the council car parking consultation, the link is http://www.staffordbc.gov.uk/consultation if anyone wants a look.
 

Wormella

Well-Known Forumite
I think people who don't drive should be given a thank you gift - money off council tax, vouchers, just something as an incentive not to drive or park in town.
 

Jade-clothing

Well-Known Forumite
Wormella said:
I think people who don't drive should be given a thank you gift - money off council tax, vouchers, just something as an incentive not to drive or park in town.
i agree. Especially as i cant drive and we dont have a car!
 

shoes

Well-Known Forumite
Wormella said:
I think people who don't drive should be given a thank you gift - money off council tax, vouchers, just something as an incentive not to drive or park in town.
I think that the people who do drive get penalised enough - fuel, tax, maintenance, insurance, parking fees - it's horrendously expensive to drive.
 

Miss Red

Well-Known Forumite
I have no choice except to drive into stafford every day. I have a daughter who has to be dropped at school at 8.30am and i have to be in work for 8.30am.
Then i have to school run again at 3pm and take her back to work with me.
I live rural - the buses run every hour and dont start until 10am!
 

Withnail

Well-Known Forumite
Asda, Tescos, Sainsburys, North Walls, Guildhall, Riverside and the soon to be opened Station car park to name but the bigger ones.

Sorry, haven't seen the E & S article or read the above link, but surely one thing Stafford does not lack is parking spaces.
 

John Marwood

I ♥ cryptic crosswords
Its not like there is anything in town worth driving a distance for is it...

I use the town for banking and the odd glass of beer and thats it nowadays apart from a weekly shop, and lately I have taken to Newport for that for a change of air...
 

CuteStaffsGuy

Well-Known Forumite
Withnail said:
Asda, Tescos, Sainsburys, North Walls, Guildhall, Riverside and the soon to be opened Station car park to name but the bigger ones.

Sorry, haven't seen the E & S article or read the above link, but surely one thing Stafford does not lack is parking spaces.
Aren't Asda, Tesco & Sainsbury's all intended for supermarket shoppers only, none of those supermarkets will want every tom dick & harry parking there and buggering off into town all day. North Walls is the one by the clinic, behind M&S? It isn't all that big not sure about the others though.

On my daily trek to work I regularly see people parking their cars on residential streets then walking into town for work, with the parking problem and the traffic nazi's handing out tickets left right and center it's almost as if the council doesn't want people to come to Stafford.
 

Vault_girl

Well-Known Forumite
shoes said:
Wormella said:
I think people who don't drive should be given a thank you gift - money off council tax, vouchers, just something as an incentive not to drive or park in town.
I think that the people who do drive get penalised enough - fuel, tax, maintenance, insurance, parking fees - it's horrendously expensive to drive.
I also agree with the point that people who drive get penalised enough, I found it was didn't actually cost much less for public transport though (not including tax, maintenance, insurance etc). When I worked in the town centre it was only slightly more expensive to drive in and park rather than using the bus, AND I didn't have to leave home an hour and a half before work to ensure I got there on time because of bus times, I left 20 minutes before instead... It just wasn't worth the walk to the bus stop and the arriving ridiculously early or risk being late. Public transport in Stafford is rubbish.
 

Withnail

Well-Known Forumite
CuteStaffsGuy said:
Aren't Asda, Tesco & Sainsbury's all intended for supermarket shoppers only, none of those supermarkets will want every tom dick & harry parking there and buggering off into town all day. North Walls is the one by the clinic, behind M&S? It isn't all that big not sure about the others though.
Tesco has a three hour free parking arrangement and no doubt picks up a lot of custom on the back of it, Sainsburys car park is owned by SBC, don't know the deal with Asda and North Walls is all that big and likewise run by SBC. Either way, the point is there are loads of parking spaces in Stafford already - regardless of ownership - where will new ones be placed?
Vault_girl said:
I also agree with the point that people who drive get penalised enough, I found it was didn't actually cost much less for public transport though
From which we can conclude that either public transport is over-priced and needs to be re-regulated or that people who drive aren't penalised enough.

Or both.
 

shoes

Well-Known Forumite
Withnail said:
CuteStaffsGuy said:
Aren't Asda, Tesco & Sainsbury's all intended for supermarket shoppers only, none of those supermarkets will want every tom dick & harry parking there and buggering off into town all day. North Walls is the one by the clinic, behind M&S? It isn't all that big not sure about the others though.
Tesco has a three hour free parking arrangement and no doubt picks up a lot of custom on the back of it, Sainsburys car park is owned by SBC, don't know the deal with Asda and North Walls is all that big and likewise run by SBC. Either way, the point is there are loads of parking spaces in Stafford already - regardless of ownership - where will new ones be placed?
Vault_girl said:
I also agree with the point that people who drive get penalised enough, I found it was didn't actually cost much less for public transport though
From which we can conclude that either public transport is over-priced and needs to be re-regulated or that people who drive aren't penalised enough.

Or both.
Penalise the motorist more? Sounds ideal, I'll just quit the job which forces me to pay over £5k tax a year into the pot and go and work at McDonalds, because I can walk there.

Edit: for what it's worth I am part of a car share scheme where at least one other person travels with me (or I travel with them) to work each day, instantly reducing the cost to the environment, our own pockets and also makes parking a whole lot easier. I quite like this system, I think more people should do it.
 

Gramaisc

Forum O. G.
There was some debate a few years ago about whether car-share schemes actually constituted a form of 'carriage for hire or reward' and so contravened most insurance policies. I don't recall how this was resolved....
 

henryscat

Well-Known Forumite
shoes said:
I think that the people who do drive get penalised enough - fuel, tax, maintenance, insurance, parking fees - it's horrendously expensive to drive.
Driving isn't as expensive as it should be. The cost of a car use to the driver do not cover all the costs that car use imposes on the state. In real terms the cost of driving has changed very little in decades. At the same time bus and rail fares have risen above inflation year on year. It isn't the driver who is being penalised.
 

joshua

Well-Known Forumite
Car parks are a cash cow, low maintenance/high profits, the motorist will be bled at every opportunity from higher parking fees to paying for on street residents parking. Yet the one thing that will remain untouched is the massive council staff car parks where the staff pay next to nothing.
 

Withnail

Well-Known Forumite
shoes said:
Penalise the motorist more? Sounds ideal, I'll just quit the job which forces me to pay over £5k tax a year into the pot and go and work at McDonalds, because I can walk there.
I'm not really advocating penalising motorists. If you want people to use public transport the price differential between it and driving has to be substantial. You either make buses cheaper or driving more expensive - the former being preferable.

That's assuming you do actually want people to use public transport of course. My point was rather that deregulating the buses has been a failure than a call to punish the driver. If you do get people on buses/trains/bikes you lessen the need for parking spaces.
 

zebidee

Well-Known Forumite
I started getting the bus to town with my daughter about 6 months ago, we used to walk with her in the pushchair, we've managed to get rid of it pretty much completely now but she finds it tough to walk a mile to town, walk all around and walk a mile back (and it's also hard on my motivational skills and patience!)

Unfortunately it's so damn expensive to get the bus when you're on a budget, £3.20 just to get there and back is crazy, for all the fuss you have to go to as well, standing around in the cold, entertaining fed up child who doesn't want to stand still, not getting a seat, mini meltdowns, constrained by times. I'd rather drive in, spend £1 - £2.40 on a few hours parking and save the hassle. I've not really found it a problem to get a space during the week. As a family we don't drive in at weekends generally though, and if we do, we'll park somewhere free for a couple of hours and visit the shops in that location, we don't really spend lots of hours in town when we go.
 

Sofa

I'm a Staffooooooordian
Ah, another consultation. I wonder if this one will be like the last two I have documented (Western Access Road http://wp.me/pyYbt-1v - and Incinerator sham http://wp.me/pyYbt-3a).

Using my magic powers of prediction I can see into the future! I predict that whatever the results of this consultation will be car parking prices will rise!!!

I will let you into a secret - I don't have any special powers. The fact is that it the administering of car parks and parking tickets costs taxpayers around £40,000 per annum. That's right - even with bringing in hundreds of thousands in parking tickets alone, the whole thing costs more than it brings in.

Reducing this deficit has been on the agenda for a couple of years. The introduction of residents' parking zones and the associated income they will generate is part of that deficit reduction plan.

Buses need to be re-regulated and Stafford needs a bus station. Longton in Stoke has less than half the population of Stafford and had a new bus station built in 2003. Fares need to fall and bus companies must provide for the needs of the passengers and not the other way round, as it currently is.

Privatisation was supposed to create competition between bus companies, improve services and lower prices. I don't think we've seen any evidence of this happening.

By increasing car parking charges and not doing anything to improve the bus situation SBC will only be serving to force more shoppers, businesses and jobs away from Stafford.
 
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