Discounted parking for residents
Borough: New scheme goes live
Discounted parking has returned to the Royal Borough after the council’s new scheme went live on Monday.
The Advantage Card has gone with discounts replaced by the RingGo cashless parking system.
Residents can apply online for an hour’s free parking at Alma Road and Alexandra Gardens in Windsor, Grove Road and West Street in Maidenhead, Meadow Lane in Eton and Horton Road in Datchet.
Since the scheme opened for applications on February 14, the council has received and approved more than 4,600 applications with 20 per cent of residents applying to get the discount in all six car parks.
From this week, residents with approved applications can start using their discounted sessions in their selected car parks, which can be activated either through the RingGo app or via landline or mobile phone using the automated voice service.
Instructions on how to use the system are located on the side of the car parking machines; residents using the automated voice service are reminded to use the fivedigit code for residents in the car parking discount scheme and not the general parking code.
Under the scheme, the two Windsor car parks are grouped as one car parking zone and the two Maidenhead car parks form another grouped zone.
The car parks at Datchet and Eton are each separate parking zones. These four different zones each have their own RingGo code which is displayed on the parking payment machine.
Residents can get one hour’s free parking every day in each car parking zone for which they hold a virtual permit. For those who wish to stay for more than one hour, the discount will be subtracted from the total amount paid.
Unlike current RingGo zones, the resident parking discount zones does not operate on a start/stop basis but is ‘buy time’.
As such, residents must decide how long they are going to stay at the time of parking and pay the appropriate amount. Stays can be extended at any time during the live parking session.
Councillor Phil Haseler, cabinet member for planning, parking, highways and transport, said: “Since we opened applications seven weeks ago, we’ve seen a positive response to our scheme, and thousands of residents have already joined up to drive down their parking costs.”