To think Free Parking is the answer to revive our town centres?

[Jumell]

I’ve been thinking a bit about this lately.

Whenever I thought about going to the city centre where I used to live, to shop/browse etc - the main thing that would stop me going was the thought of paying for parking - I’d just think - ‘nah’ - and not bother going in.

i think that if the Govt took the initiative to scrap all charges from car parking companies - NCP/Councils etc etc in town centres / high streets - it would massively revive these shopping centres that we all knew and loved?

Then they need help to organise it all, as many just don't have the headspace for everything that needs dealing with.

It's also just displacing the people, as someone else will need to move into the homes vacated by the older people who in turn will need to drive for the same reasons, i.e. lack of public transport.

Thats down to our shockingly easy driving test.... its pathetic.

HGV drivers etc have a far harder level of instruction, hence per mile, farless accidents.

Labour are refusing to bring in eye sight tests for the over 70s, despite the overwhelming evidence they are needed.

So NHS, Police etc will continue to pick up the pieces and at great expense, then there is the personal tragedy.

Most people either want something and need to get in and out of a shop quickly or they are looking for a shopping experience and to spend the day wandering around shops and having lunch etc

Neither of which most town centres/high streets are fit for.

You can’t just nip into anywhere to buy something anymore, you are directed to parking which isn’t free, and then you have to walk to the store. If they don’t have what you want you could waste money and an hour of your life on a fruitless venture

If you are wanting the shopping experience and want a day shopping and having lunch and coffees etc having to pay £4 per hour on top for parking is a huge consideration

Moved to an area just like this

I have been into the town centre once

Never seen a Primark where you could count the number of customers on one hand on a Saturday afternoon

Realised why when I left and was stung with an £11 parking charge (1 hour and 10 minutes in a multi storey quite a walk from any shops. Possibly because most of the shops are boarded up and I can see Primark closing down its branch there.

All I see from the local council is how they can discourage motorists and revive the town centre.

They seem set on making the town a place for a shopping experience but don’t see that those who live here who can walk or take the bus into the centre aren’t the ones with the means to make any significant impact and those that can are coming from out of town in their cars and don’t want to get a £40 or £50 bill for parking

London is a major tourist destination. It needs hotels. The tourists staying there will be spending plenty of money in the local area. It makes zero sense to put a car park there, in a city with good PT, on the grounds that London mums might occasionally want to pop into a Top Shop.

Nobody is proposing making driving difficult in villages though. The topic of conversation here is about urban areas. Cities which enact policies that make driving into the center of the city sifficult, can and generally do create park n ride facilities. If you are rural, you drive to the park n ride, and park there, to switch to PT.

There is a thread on here about eye sight test, man is very much against an eye sight test for drivers ( it’s in the last 2 years)

Our city’s only pnr is the opposite end so you have to drive through the congested one way system and drive out of town again to park and get the bus back into town and then do the reverse afterwards. Pointless waste of time. It’s fine for those living at that end of the city outskirts but not for our end. But even then, you’re not going to spend time parking and waiting for buses if you only want to nip n and make a quick purchase. You’re going to drive to the retail park or supermarket instead as it’ll be quicker and free.

If someone lives in a town centre they will have access to public transport to all those places, especially if that town centre is london, but then if they lived in central london, theyre probably doing ok

The poster was talking about town centres

Talking about preserving town centres. That has to include talking about how people living outside the town centre can actually travel into the town centre, soyouhave to consider people living in the outskirts and outlying smaller towns and villages.

Its incredibly selfish to drive in central london if you don't need to.

Cars have dominated our roads far too long, its amazing that cities like london and paris are trying to get rid of the from the centre. This is what our future cities will look like, you might as well get on board (scuse pun)

The country can’t afford London style public transport in every town and city!

Is it so hard to understand that not every town has great public transport?
I’ve lived in different houses. First one was very close to a train and bus station. It wasn’t a big town by any standards, more of a big village. Yet it had good transport links. The nearest bus stop was a 3 minute walk from my house.
I didn’t drive then and it was fine.
I moved due to having a family and needing more room. Only moved a few miles away to a lovely house but the nearest bus stop was a good 13 minutes walk, more on the way back as it was up a very steep hill. No train station or bus station but a much better house. Thats when I learnt to drive as I would have found it very difficult with 2 young children and poor access to transport.
Next, I lived on a main road near a bus stop. Again good bus links but a more dodgy area with some dodgy neighbours. A good house but not great area.
Now live in a very nice area but again public transport is shocking. This is a town btw.
We have a car.

My local town has free parking (not the size to have primark but does have cinema, fatface, medium M&S, sports direct etc). it definitely makes it easier to nip in but the centre still seems to be struggling a bit with empty shops etc. I’m sure today it’ll be rammed though, super busy at weekends still.

I rarely go to the lovely nearest city due to traffic, parking, hassle of getting park n ride etc. I don’t think they have an issue with lack of visitors though as it’s quite a touristy city.

This is what they have where my Mum lives in Denmark.

Parking is free for the first two hours, and you pay on exit, so are charged for however long you stay.
I think it's a much better system!

Where did i suggest that? I was replying specifically to the poster who wants to drive into central london to shop.

I don’t know.

I only go into our town centre once a week or every two weeks for the library or to restock on food and home supplies other than that I could probably go weeks without having to go into it.

Anything other than that I go to Oxford or London.

There is nothing entertainment wise in the evenings other than the movies if you don’t drink and don’t want to just go to a restaurant.

To me the issue with going into town is normally I want one thing, and I want to be quick.

Going to the big car park (which is at one end of town) takes ages longer than if I could just park on the streets and run into the shop.

Our town changed almost all the 30 minutes spaces on the streets into disabled spaces. Which I totally understand why, however it's easier to order on line now.

There used to be a line of 6 30 minute spaces that were just off the town centre and you'd always get a space there within once circle of the town - which was quicker than going into the multi-storey.
They changed all but one into disabled. I don't normally bother trying for the single one I could use, but on the times I have tried it, I haven't been able to get it.

I do think the council was right to change them to disability spaces, because the people that do need them can get them and the multi-storey, whereas it does have the ground floor as disabled spaces, someone in a wheelchair would have to go a long way round to avoid the stairs and someone who struggled to walk would find it too far from most of the shops.

I wouldn't mind paying £1 for 30 minutes park, but it's the convenience for what I'd use town for now.

If I was going in for a longer Christmas shop, then I'm very happy to use (and pay for) the multi-storey.

So I don't think it would make a difference to me.

It's cheaper to park all day than take a bus for me and a child into town (from 6 minutes away) anyway.

If the car parks are free, the money to maintain them is usually then pushed on to the business landlords in the form of higher business rates which are then passed onto the business tenants in the form of higher rents.

I think you will find that the local council owns town centre car parks but leases the operation of them to private companies. The companies are under contract to collect enough revenue to maintain the car parks, enforce parking nonpayment by issuing PCNs, and then keep any extra as profit. The council gets a regular lease income in exchange for the risk being taken on by a private company.

Even large companies that own their car park- say Tesco or Waitrose has started to lease them to a parking company who then charges for parking in return for the same as above.

Uh what exactly do they need 100s of 1000s per year to maintain? they don't, our council charge a fortune to park on waste ground.

Monies needed for some mtce such as painting faded parking bay lines could be funded via more modest charges for long stay.

Its a money making scam, just as council tax is, forced on councils because the Tory govt have slashed funding to councils - very short term because it is closing businesses and affecting tourism in areas that rely on it, such as Devon and Cornwall

Paying a couple of quid to park is really not the reason I don't go into my town.
The fact that every other shop is a cafe, and the others are poncey over priced boutiques and there are actually no decent shops (other than Savers) is why I don't go in and pretty much shop online

Not every town and not necessarily on the scale of London, but in most European countries, cities the size of Brum and Leeds have proper metros, and smaller cities and large towns have trams and urban light rail.

The UK is struggling because

a. Bad and excessive regulations have made it unusually expensive to build PT
b. The UK has weird doughnut cities where few people live in the center, due to the cultural preoccupation with houses and gardens for everyone, and the dislike of having tall buildings. Roughly speaking, when you have lots of people living densely in the center of a city, these ppl use PT a lot over short distances, putting lots of fares into the system, and this then effectively subsidizes the loss-making sections that reach into the suburbs. The UK does not have this, meaning that the entire network is likely to be heavily loss making.

Mary portas proposed this a good 12 years ago.