Newark and Sherwood District Council is introducing free 30 minutes car parking for its three inner town car parks in Newark.
From 8 April, the car parks at Town Wharf, Appleton Gate and London Road/Balderton Gate will allow users to obtain a free 30-minute ticket at the parking machines. It is important that car users still display this car park ticket otherwise they may receive a penalty charge notice.
The District Council hopes that this will encourage residents to park in its inner town centre car parks to visit their favourite independent retailer or local market trader within the 30-minute window, making “popping into town” a better experience for all. Picking up lunch from one of the town centre’s fantastic take-away cafes will involve free parking, and it hopes this will go a small way in helping residents and local businesses.
Unlike many other districts, boroughs, towns and cities across the UK, the wider charges for the use of Newark’s car parks have not been reviewed for 10 years with the last increase in tariffs across all the authority’s car parks being in 2015.
Many local authorities across the UK are implementing increases to their car park charges to mitigate the ever-increasing costs that local authorities currently face. This is no different for Newark and Sherwood, with the cost for managing and maintaining car parks having increased substantially in the 10 years since 2015. A revision of its car parking charges is well overdue and a balance needs to be struck between addressing the increase in costs of maintenance and continuing to provide affordable car parking to all car park users.
The price for one hour parking across all inner town and out of town car parks will remain the same. A small increase is being implemented for car parking charges of more than one hour, ranging from 20p at the outer town car parks to a 50p increase at the inner town car parks for stays longer than four hours. Season tickets are also increasing in line with these changes.
All the District Council’s public car parks have received the annual British Parking Association (BPA) accreditations for eight consecutive years, showcasing that they are maintained to the highest standard. This includes the Park Mark Safer Parking Award and the BPA and Disabled Motoring UK Award of Excellence Park Access Accreditation.
Sanjiv Kohli, Deputy Chief Executive and Director of Resources at Newark and Sherwood District Council said: “Our car parks are managed and maintained to a high standard and we have recently made several improvements to these including to the lighting and CCTV. We will also be replacing the parking machines to improve the customer experience and to ensure value for money and peace of mind for those who drive to Newark and leave their vehicles in our car parks.
“We hope residents will take advantage of the free 30 minutes, allowing them to make those quick trips to a town centre shop or market stall for their daily essentials. It is not something we have offered before and we look forward to reviewing how this change is being received. I am also particularly pleased that we can, once again, freeze the charge for parking for up to one hour in our inner and outer town car parks.”
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