Parking charge plans delayed
A PLAN to charge for parking at Birmingham’s Cannon Hill Park has been put on hold by a council watchdog committee.
The city’s corporate services scrutiny committee blocked the charges as they found bosses had not properly consulted users of the Edgbaston park.
Charges of £2 for four hours and £3 for a whole day were due to be introduced from June 23 – but are now likely to be delayed.
Money raised would have covered the costs of a £450,000 upgrade of the car park – including resurfacing at the nearby Birmingham Wildlife Park, CCTV, lights, parking meters and signs.
Any profit over that was expected to be spent offsetting the cuts to the park services such as covering the costs of keepers and maintenance.
The committee heard that of the thousands of park users there were just 13 responses.
Cllr Ewan Mackey (Cons, Sutton Trinity) who issued the official challenge, said: “Yet again this Labour administration has not consulted its residents in a meaningful manner.
“Until the council learns to listen to its residents, things will continue to go wrong.”
Cllr Rob Pocock Sutton Vesey) also lenged the move.
He said: “The consultation hasn’t been as good as it should be.
“We need to listen to the users who are going (Lab, chal- to be paying the money.”
Labour cabinet member for parks, Lisa Trickett, said she would now ensure users, from dog walkers to organised groups were informed of the proposals and a chance to respond.
“That car park is not good, the surface is poor and it is not safe at night for people visiting the Mac.
“The only way we could raise the money to invest was through charges,” she said.
She added that the council had withdrawn a proposal to scrap park keepers following a public outcry and needed to find other ways to cover running costs, including car park charges.
The charges cannot now be implemented at least until the council’s cabinet has had another chance to consider them at its June meeting.
The committee also heard that there was a linked plan to introduce parking restrictions on residential streets surrounding Cannon Hill Park to prevent displacement after charges were introduced.
Plans for further parking charges at Sutton Park are also being drawn up.