Permit option for parking hotspots?
Council bid to ease congestion near station
A review into residents’ parking permit zones (RPPZs) looks set to get underway this month.
Parking in streets near Hairmyres train station and an area near the old Murray Primary School are being considered for the introduction of new RPPZs or additions or amendments to existing restrictions in place.
The wider review being undertaken by South Lanarkshire Council is set to begin today.
A pre-consultation into changes near the station could be underway by the beginning of November and last for eight weeks.
The council-wide review into RPPZs is due to conclude no later than early next summer.
Details of the plans and an update on their progress are included in a report set to go before councillors at a meeting of the local authority’s road safety forum today.
An earlier report into the proposals was put before councillors at a meeting of the community and enterprise committee in August and it was agreed they would be taken forward via the road safety forum.
In 2011, the council’s executive committee agreed to reduce the size of the permit zones in East Kilbride with a policy thereafter to not consider any further RPPZs. However, the report states that due to increasing pressure near train stations, town centres and some medical facilities, a review now needs to take pace.
Residents living near the station have long complained about cars blocking drives as motorists are unable to find space at the park-andride facility.
And with the car parks at University Hospital Hairmyres also often jampacked, those attending the facility can also be forced to park in nearby streets.
The pre-consultation into new RPPZs near the station will involve community councils, business groups and other partners.
Residents will also have an opportunity to take part in the process via an online questionnaire.
Council officers state in the report that the consultation itself will begin in spring next year and “the formal statutory procedures to implement the new RPPZs which, given the likely issues generated and objections received, could take between nine to 12 months to resolve”.
The report states, however, that expanded RPPZs near the old Murray Primary – Creed Grove, Forbes Place and Baird Hill – should be operational by spring 2019, subject to any objections received being “satisfactorily resolved”.
It adds: “There is also an area on the boundary of the Murray zone that has been redeveloped in recent years [from school use to residential] which requires amendments/additions to the existing traffic regulation order.”