Residents First

Parking boost for Hammersmith and Fulham motorists

Parking charges are set to be frozen and the 200th new parking bay opened in a package of measures to help hard-pressed motorists.

Hammersmith & Fulham (H&F) Council has pledged to freeze borough-wide parking permits and pay and display charges and will create around 20 new parking spaces, around Loftus Road, meaning the borough has 200 extra parking bays than it did in 2007.

It will be the fourth year out of five that parking charges have been frozen by the council, if the move is formally agreed at a budget council meeting later this month. The standard price for an hour's pay and display parking in H&F is set to stay at £2.20, while in town centres – where parking is at a premium – it will remain at £2.80.

H&F’s prices are among the lowest in inner London and are significantly lower than Camden (£4.90) and Lambeth (£4.20). The H&F resident’s parking permit is set to remain £181 cheaper than the most expensive borough which is Islington (£300).

The council is also set to create its 200th additional parking bay since 2007 in a move to ease parking congestion in Britain’s fourth smallest borough. The plans to freeze charges and create more bays comes on top of other driver friendly initiatives delivered by the council over recent years. These include:

More parking bays for Shepherds Bush

More parking spaces and new car club bays are set to be created in Shepherds Bush following a parking consultation.

Around 20 new spaces are set to be created by Hammersmith & Fulham Council (H&F Council) in controlled parking zone V, around Queen’s Park Rangers’ home ground, Loftus Road, and surrounding White City.

There is also more good news for residents as H&F Council will be introducing the Smart visitor permit for cheaper parking for residents’ visitors, and more bays for car club vehicles. There will be no change to parking restrictions, as the vast majority of respondents voted against any alterations.

The decision comes on the back of the consultation in November 2011, where 81 per cent of respondents said they did not want parking controls to be extended on weekdays. The current controls run from 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday, with motorists being able to park for up to eight hours using pay and display.

Over 88 per cent of respondents said they wanted to keep the current controls on Sundays the same while 78 per cent did not want to see changes to the Saturday restrictions either. In response to the question ‘would you like shorter maximum stay for pay and display parking to be introduced?’, 84 per cent said no.

Deputy leader Cllr Nick Botterill said:

“We had a very high response rate to our consultation with the overwhelming majority of people opting not to change the current controlled parking hours. There was a real enthusiasm for the visitor permit and for car club bays.

"We had not reviewed parking in the area since it became a controlled zone in January 1997 and this shows we are listening to residents, by giving the majority of people who responded what they want."

More than 8,140 consultation leaflets were delivered to residents and businesses in zone V and there was an overall response rate of 11.4 per cent, which is above average for a parking consultation.

Many residents and businesses who replied to the questionnaire – 182 of them – said they would consider joining a car club if a dedicated bay was introduced in their area, while 28 people who responded are already members of a car club.

Research from TfL shows that, last year, 13 per cent of car club members sold a car immediately before joining a car club and six per cent sold one after joining. That works out around 1,680 cars being removed from the road last year.

The changes are expected to be made by the end of March with funding for the new parking spaces coming from Section 106 money as part of a planning agreement with Westfield, while TfL is funding the car club bays.

For more information on the Smart visitor permit and car clubs, visit www.lbhf.gov.uk/parking.

Council to freeze parking charges in boost to drivers

Local motorists are set for a boost after the council announced plans to freeze borough-wide parking charges next year.

Residents’ parking permits and pay and display charges will not rise under the proposals announced by Hammersmith & Fulham Council today, bucking the trend nationally for increasing parking charges .

It is the fourth time in five years that parking and permit charges have been frozen by the council, and charges in H&F remain lower than those in many other similar local authorities. The council has also created around 200 more parking bays in the last four years to ease parking congestion in Britain’s fourth smallest borough.

Cllr Nick Botterill, H&F Council deputy leader, said:

“We know that local people are feeling the pinch and this is one way of showing our support by giving residents some financial respite. We are making sure motorists get a fair deal by not increasing our parking permits or pay and display charges.”

Simpler rules for traffic signs welcomed

New guidance on traffic and parking signs is making it easier for councils to get rid of unnecessary signage and de-clutter the nation’s streets.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has responded to calls from Hammersmith & Fulham Council for more flexibility when deciding what signs or parking lines are created. As a result, the DfT has agreed to make signage ‘simpler’ and of a ‘more concise design’, and to remove unnecessary or duplicated signs.

The council called for the move last September (2010) as part of its 105 ways to slash red tape.

Cllr Nick Botterill, deputy leader of H&F Council and cabinet member for environment, said:

“This is great news for the enemies of waste and bureaucracy and is a victory for common sense. We have been saying for years that traffic sign rules and regulations are too prescriptive and this has spawned far too many street signs that lead to confusion and gridlock. Allowing councils to keep signage to a minimum will make things clearer for all road users and will reduce the need for ugly pillars or posts on our streets.”

Residents’ Consultation leads to changes in Parking

The opening of Westfield, Europe’s biggest urban shopping mall, has had a profound impact on the Shepherds Bush area as a whole. It was to be expected therefore that Westfield’s effect would be felt on local parking provision over a wide area and indeed in the first stage consultation exercises which took place in January 2009 residents suggested that this was the case. More recent detailed consultation exercises took place in July 2009 in two of the parking zones nearest to the shopping mall, namely zones J and G, and these produced a much more mixed picture.

Devising appropriate parking controls for an area can be very difficult as residents can have different favoured solutions (sometimes diametrically opposed!) which broadly depend on their own personal situation and their requirements for parking. Under the current Conservative administration, Hammersmith & Fulham Council always seeks to look for a broad consensus view from residents before it will change or alter any aspect of the local parking regime although there is an understanding that there may not be a one size fits all solution.

In parking zone J, residents reported some continuing impact from Westfield but there was no appetite for enhanced parking controls both in terms of days of operation or the hours covered and these options were opposed by a broad consensus. This was surprising as some residents had previously described problems caused on days when there were football matches at QPR. On the matter of introducing parking controls on Saturday, a narrow majority was opposed to this. As a result of this feedback from residents, there will be few changes to parking in zone J although council officers will look to maximizing spaces available for parking and reducing unnecessary single lines where feasible to do so as part of the review.

In parking zone G which is closer to Westfield and surrounds the Shepherds Bush town centre, there was much more appetite for enhanced controls. Majorities of over 2 to1 supported the enhanced controlled hours to 10pm and the retention of controls on Sundays which had been introduced as an emergency measure when Westfield opened. Overall 70% supported the retention of shared parking bays for both residents and visitors although there was an overwhelming vote for even more enhanced controls in Macfarlane Road which is literally yards from the main entrance to Westfield and has suffered hugely as a result. Maximum visitor stays for people paying cash will be reduced to 1 hour although residents’ visitors using the electronic Smart Visitor Permit will be able to stay for longer at preferential rates. The permit only period in the evenings will be retained but it was not possible to get approval from central government for the weekend afternoon permit only period to be retained. However given the lower maximum stay period of 1 hour, longer term parking by outsiders at weekends is expected to be less of a problem.

The Council has tried to adopt a common sense approach and realizes the needs of residents and local businesses has to be balanced. We will also be introducing 20p half-an-hour short stay bays for visitors to the market between 10am and 4pm although these will be located away from current residents parking and won’t result in any net loss of spaces. It is clearly in the interests of residents, and an aim of the Council, for shoppers to be incentivised to use the Westfield car park and not park on the streets. As a result of the various changes there will be slightly differing controls on different streets within zone G but we believe this is a small price to pay for seeking to deliver a more equitable parking scheme.

It has taken some time to ascertain what the effects from Westfield on local parking have been. Now we are several months in and patterns have settled down residents are clearer about what needs to be done and the Council is confident that we have devised a better series of changes as a result of the various consultations over the period. As was stated initially, it can be difficult to get it right with parking but this Conservative Council will always strive to make its motto “Putting Residents First” a reality.

Cllr Nick Botterill
Deputy Leader of the Council and Cabinet Member for the Environment

Parking on Talgarth Road

We have been wary of Transport for London’s (TfL) intentions with regard to parking on the footway to the south side of A4/Talgarth Road (between North End and Gliddon Rds) ever since last year when they approached the Council saying that it was dangerous. Parking has always been free in this location and it provides a useful overflow from the high parking stress in zone D of Barons Court. A cursory review showed no particular history of road accidents as a result of parking on the footway and TfL dropped their demand for an immediate ban on such parking.

Now TfL has come back saying that following a structural survey they believe the footway could collapse in certain sections. It is therefore with great reluctance that the Council has conceded that it is necessary to suspend parking in this area at least until and unless further planned structural surveys can give it the all clear. The Council will ensure that appropriate publicity is delivered to nearby residents advising them of the restrictions and will hold TfL to getting these surveys completed as soon as possible.

Cllr Nick Botterill
Deputy Leader of the Council and Cabinet Member for the Environment