The British Parking Association at 40, and its ‘Master Plan for Parking’ from Page 25


The problemis that although theBPA’s credentials and intent


are clear to many in the industry, they have some way to go with the public, whose views, often fuelled by aggressive negative media coverage, still often perceive parking operations as little more than highway robbery. Legislation would help, but I cannot see that this is going to be on the government’s radar for some time. Also, I cannot see that the guy who operates 20 parking spaces outside a country pub is going to rush to support anything that applies yetmore bureaucracy to his business. The reference to hospital parking is frankly bizarre. Scot-


land,Wales andNorthern Ireland havemade policy decisions that exclude parking charges from public hospital car parks. These measures have created administrative and financial problems that inevitably will result in a return to charged parking. In England, hospitals that fail to apply basic common sense


and follow good practices in dealing with the chronically sick create bad PR and fodder for the press. The last government launched a consultation on hospital parking charges, which meandered through the issues and failed to reach any conclusion, except to tentatively suggest a few half-baked ideas that would have been both expensive and unworkable. Regarding, penalty charges. In reading the document, there seems to be considerable confusion between two issues: the level of parking penalty need- ed to discourage parking contraventions and the cost of operating parking.They are not the same. In earlier times when parking fines were set by central gov-


ernment and parking charges were set locally, it was not unusual to see a situation where it cost more to park on a meter for a day than to get a fine. Decriminalized parking should have allowed the local authorities to manage the charge/penalty differential so as to ensure that this did not happen. Unfortunately, the dead hand of government kept the penalty charge levels within the control of government that set national charge levels, which have no link to local parking charges. This was a retrograde step that needs correcting. But – and


it’s a big but – that doesn’t mean that the charge needed to deter illegal parking bears any relationship to the cost of providing the enforcement service. There also are some pretty fundamental questions to be


asked about how parking is delivered and enforced. If I can show parking signs to a lawyer with 25 years’ experience of traffic law and he can’t understand them, what chance does the average driver have? The other points in theBPA’s plan are sensible – to raise stan-


dards and enhance skills – but I do wonder how widely the BPA consulted, even within its own membership, before producing this document. Sorry, guys, you don’t get a pass on this one.


Peter Guest is Parking Today’s correspondent for all things British and European. He can be reached at peterguestparking@hotmail.co.uk.


PT


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SEPTEMBER 2010 • PARKING TODAY • www.parkingtoday.com


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