On-street parking permits in Shropshire may double in cost

Shropshire Council is proposing to increase the cost of on-street parking permits for residents across the county from £50 to £100 a year.

The new on-street parking policy would also cost the council almost £120,000 to put in place.

The cost includes paying for a new virtual permitting process which would allow residents to change and update their details, such as change of vehicle, online and by telephone.

Resident permit holders will also now receive, without an additional charge, an annual visitor permit allowance.

The council says that the additional income received from residents' permits over three years would cover the implementation costs and the additional demand on enforcement required.

This is the second part of the authority's parking strategy, after a "linear model" for parking tariffs was approved earlier this year.

New fees approved by Shropshire Council's cabinet in January will see all car parks and on-street zones sorted into seven bands as part of a new 'linear pricing' approach.

The charges range from £2.50 per hour in band one, to no charge in band seven.

After the strategy was passed, it was called in for a review by the council's Liberal Democrat group and debated by the authority's place overview committee, which said no changes should be recommended to cabinet.

Dismissed

However, it was decided that the call-in had initially been brought before the wrong committee and it was taken back for a second time to be discussed by the performance management scrutiny committee.

But the decision was a repeat of the initial verdict as it was dismissed for a second time.

Now Shropshire Council's cabinet will make a decision on the second part of the policy.

The authority says the main reason for introducing a residents’ parking scheme is that there is not enough space for residents to park because of existing restrictions and/or the presence of vehicles due to visitor or commuter parking.

There are currently on-street schemes operating in Bridgnorth, Ludlow and Oswestry -– permits in Oswestry are currently available free of charge.

The existing policy allows residents to purchase books of parking permits which can be given to their visitors, each book contains 20 half day permits.

The new proposal is that each property in the area would be entitled to receive a maximum allocation of up to 200 hours of visitors parking per year.

Shropshire Council's cabinet will make a decision on the proposals tomorrow.