Street parking charges will be back on the agenda in couple months says Councillor Don Mackenzie. The previously plans had been deferred in February 2016. The announcements was at a recent meeting of the Harrogate Chamber of Trade and Commerce.
The previous proposals from County Council were modified from those initially tabled. The last proposal was for a flat rate of £2 for evening parking and normal hourly parking rates for a Sunday, from 10am until 5pm. Both thses times are currently free.
Councillor Mackenzie, Executive Member for Highways for North Yorkshire County Council, has said that any changes will not be driven by revenue generation. County Council has previously published figures that the changes would raise £330K per year on top of the £2.5million currently raised.
There has been a whole review of parking arrangements in the town centre. This has been in conjunction with Harrogate Borough Council who operate a number of off-street parking facilities.
Councillor Rebecca Burnett, the Harrogate Borough Council’s Cabinet Member for Planning and Sustainable Transport said that she was keen to make use of the off-street parking and that measures would likely be approved by cabinet later this month. Off-street parking generates revenue for the Borough Council.
The town centre multi-storey carparks are often underused during an evening and charges would likely act as encouragement for people to use, although they are currently not open late into an evening.
Councillor Mackenzie believes that the overuse of the town centre street parking “detracts from the use of the town”
There remains little support for the introduction. Andrew Jones MP commented in November 2015 that charges can not be introduced to increase revenue and there has to be good traffic management reasons for any introduction. He also noted that there was no evidence for the introduction of evening charges on that basis.
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