Reach Road Car Park Update & DDC Parking Strategy

Reach Road Car Park – we encourage you, in addition to the Petition, to also write to the DDC Councillor who is responsible for the Strategy to raise any concerns you have with the proposal to charge at the village car park. Although the detail still needs to be worked through, the current proposal is:

Introduce charging for stays of 1hr or more

2-4hrs at a charge of £2 per hour

More than 4 hours a charge of £2.50 per hour

Introduce a Residents Permit system (there will be a charge – cost unknown at this time)

Please write to:

Cllr-Lynne Wright

Email: Cllr-Lynne.Wright@DOVER.GOV.UK

and we ask you to copy our Parish Clerk

Email: parish.clerk@stmargaretspc.co.uk

(Please note you may receive an ‘out of office’ from Cllr Wright – this is fine as by copying the Clerk, we can note the number of resident emails that have been sent, to be noted at the Oversight & Scrutiny Meeting on Monday and any additional concerns to those we are raising can be included for noting at the meeting, and upon her return Cllr Wright can review).

TIME CRITICAL – YOUR HELP NEEDED NOW!

You will recall that earlier in the year DDC tabled a revised Parking Strategy which included Reach Road Car Park and the potential for charging. The Cabinet deferred the Strategy….based on the below…..

“That it be recommended to Cabinet that they withdraw any considerations and don’t implement charges until all parking assets have been visited, examined and data collected. This of course must include all car parks which currently do not charge a fee and not simply focus on a targets selection which invariably have only single tiny car parks within their locality. They should also of course complete the project by considering the material state of the assets with recommendations as to how they should improve”

The revised Strategy has now been presented to DDC Cabinet this week, with very little change or indeed taken into account the above points!

Reach Road Car Park is in Phase 2 of the Strategy, BUT we do need to take some action now!

As before, your Parish Council continue to work closely with Councillor Martin Bates. The next step, before approval, is for the Strategy to be reviewed at the Oversight & Scrutiny Committee at DDC on Monday (10th November). Your Parish Council will be writing a letter, to be read out by Cllr Bates, at that Committee.

We also NEED YOUR HELP. An online Petition has been established and we encourage you to sign the Petition if you agree the Strategy should be properly considered taking into account all the points raised previously and the basis for the ‘pause’ in May and further review – as it stands, there is very little change from the version proposed in May.

Sign the online petition 

Our letter to the Oversight & Scrutiny Committee will be published on our website in due course.