Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
Crackdown on illegal street parking planned
Car park cameras will free-up traffic wardens Exclusive
Traffic wardens will be told to focus their efforts on poor street parking following a decision to install cameraactivated barriers across all the district’s car parks.
Rolling out the technology at a cost of £1.3 million will drastically reduce the need for enforcement officers to patrol 25 car parks in Canterbury, Herne Bay and Whitstable.
The net effect will be more wardens freed up to tackle long- running issues like pavement parking and parents stopping outside school gates.
Figures support the move, with almost 500 extra tickets dished out to motorists falling foul of street parking rules during a six-month trial of the cameras last year.
Across the same period, 666 fewer penalty notices were issued in the trial sites – Pound Lane in Canterbury, Middle Wall in Whitstable and William Street in Herne Bay.
The technology forces drivers to fork out for the exact time they stay, effectively reducing the number of people who get away with not paying to zero.
“We always knew that automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras would lead to much less enforcement in the trial car parks, which the figures clearly show,” said council spokes- man Rob Davies.
“It’s good news for motorists, with fewer penalty charge notices given out, as many of those would have been for overstaying their time – something that is not possible in ANPR car parks.”
The wider installation of camera-activated barriers is likely to prove popular with residents who have longcalled for a clampdown on on-street parking offences.
Pavement parking in Canterbury and Whitstable is an ongoing issue, with emergency services complaining of not being able to navigate narrow residential streets.
In Herne Bay, motorists stopping on the wrong side of the Hugh Street to pick up takeaways has also proved a bone of contention, sparking claims of council inaction.
Mr Davies said: “Greater on- street enforcement in locations such as Whitstable High Street is something that many businesses and residents have been calling for, and we would be able to do even more of this should we expand the ANPR system to more of our off-street car parks.”
The council’s regeneration and property committee will tonight (Thursday) take a vote on rolling out the ANPR scheme, which has been recommended for approval by officers.
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