14 September (Part 2) - Team GB floats some ideas
I
didn’t get around to reading councillor
Gareth Bacon’s consultation paper on parking until yesterday and I recommend
you have a look too, for in it are floated a number of ideas about the future of
car parking facilities in Bexley. It is an easy enough read and remarkably free of Craskeisms.
A lonely example still exists, the comparison of the cost of parking next to Greenwich’s Maritime
Museum with Bexley’s shopping centres. As everyone knows, Greenwich Town Centre is
not a shopping area at all, it is one of London’s foremost tourist spots.
Councillor Bacon raises the possibility of flogging off the car parks, closing some and banning
street parking. On the other hand he considers preferential charging for Bexley residents and a
hint of flexibility over the unpopular phone only parking scheme. Needless to say there is
nothing to suggest that council leader Teresa O’Neill wasn’t lying when she said at the
Boris Johnson roadshow
that she would take away the idea of a 15 minute grace period to help save small shops.
No one will be surprised at that.
At a south coast town I used to visit often in the 1990s residents used a
cardboard clock like those issued to the disabled to help prioritise the car
parks for locals but I suppose that is not high tech enough for Bexley. Whatever
your view on parking take a look at the council’s website and let them know your
views. The number of people who took part in the Strategy 2014 consultation (the cuts)
was pathetic and despite the fact that nearly every suggestion which wasn’t already
on the council’s to do list was dismissed at least the suggestions did get on to
the record and could be analysed. Give Mr. Bacon your views, he says he
wants your opinion, it’s more than the 42 year old from Sidcup ever did before
imposing phone only parking.
For the source of the picture above, see
the News Shopper report. Bexley’s finest is ticketing a bus for the
disabled. One optimist (goldenbroomboy) has commented that the Parking Adjudicator might
recommend to Bexley they waive the ticket.
It didn’t do any good last time.
(See also News Shopper’s
report of Bexley’s defiance of the Parking Adjudicator.)