Following recent commentary on our confirmed forthcoming changes to car parking charges, we’d like to take the opportunity to clarify what is happening and clear up some confusion.
The changes to parking charges are scheduled to come into effect in early 2021. There are no current plans to review or reconsider this decision.
Update 19 November:
Reports on the parking services project which was started in early 2020 are going to both Scrutiny Committee and Cabinet in December. The initial report will be published on 23 November. It will be discussed at Place and Resources Scrutiny Committee on 1 December. Comments from this committee will be included in the Cabinet report, which will be discussed and voted on by Cabinet members on 8 December.
Question: “Won’t these changes double the daily fee across Dorset?”
Answer: All existing car park tariffs will remain unchanged EXCEPT for Lyme Regis (Charmouth Road and Holmbush) and West Bay (East Beach, Station Yard and West Bay Road) where car park charges will be increased from £2 for all day parking to £4. The last review of charges in these popular visitor destinations was in April 2014.
Q: “Why has this been done without consultation?”
A: As charges are an operational matter, Dorset Council is not required to consult. The decision to change car parking charges was made by Cllr Ray Bryan, who states: “I made this operational decision following information from officers, using my powers as Portfolio Holder for Highways, Travel and Environment.
“We wrote to Town and Parish Councils on Friday morning to inform them of these forthcoming changes, while simultaneously issuing communications to Dorset Council members and the public so they can hear the news directly from us well in advance of the changes coming into effect.
“If these changes were proposals or part of a consultation, we would have engaged with councillors at an earlier stage to discuss. That said, I give my assurance to all Dorset Councillors and town and parish councils that they will be fully involved in the wider policy review of car parking charges early next year.”
Q: “Won’t these new charges hit the local economy at a time when it needs help?”
A: Shoppers across Dorset who park to do shopping during daytimes on weekdays and Saturdays will see no changes at all in parking charges.
Parking charges in Lyme Regis and West Bay will increase from £2 to £4 for all day, but we expect this to have a greater impact on visitors than shoppers. For example, short stay car parks are available in Lyme Regis, charged at £0.70 for 1 hour and £1.60 for 2 hours.
Free car parks will remain free, on-street parking is unaffected.
The decision to extend the chargeable period by two hours (from 6pm to 8pm) and to introduce paying to park on Sundays applies to car parks in eight locations: Beaminster, Blandford, Bridport, Dorchester, Gillingham, Shaftesbury, Sherborne and Sturminster Newton. The Sunday parking decision was made to provide consistency across the Dorset Council area, bringing these car parks into line with other council-run car parks.
Dorset Council’s car parks cost money to run. Costs include resurfacing, patrolling, and maintenance of payment facilities. Dorset Council also pays business rates on car parks. It is essential that parking charges cover the cost of running and providing these facilities.
Dorset Council is also looking to introduce a council-wide shoppers’ permit which will provide good value parking for Dorset residents, in turn supporting the local economy. The permit has run in West Dorset for 23 years and provides shoppers with discounted parking in short stay car parks to help them shop locally. A shoppers’ permit consultation will start this autumn to help evaluate the proposal.
Next steps
A public consultation on proposals for a new council-wide shoppers’ permit will be launched shortly.
Phase 2: A review of the policy for car parking charges is planned for early next year. This will look at all charges across Dorset Council-run car parks as well as permits, season tickets and any other new incentives alongside wider parking charge changes.
Dorset Council members will be fully involved in this with the opportunity to shape the new policy, which will align the new costing strategy with the Local Plan, Transport Plan and the Climate and Ecological action plan. Proposals will be submitted to the Place and Resources Overview Committee, and town and parish councils will also be engaged and asked to comment. This will be followed by a referral to the Place and Resources Scrutiny Committee before coming to Cabinet for decision.
So as I read it. No consultation on the 6pm to 8pm charges.
This looks to me like “sneaking” in extra charges when the car parks are under utilised anyway due to Covid, so when we get back to some form of normality the charges will already be in place. Moving the free period from 6pm to 8pm and charging on Sunday’s will have an affect on the hospitality industry in our towns. The same people who have brought in these changes are probably the same ones who bemoan the loss of our high streets and town centres to out of town shopping and entertainment centres where the parking is free. Well done DCC on a very large backward step taken when the country is already in crisis.
Unbelievable that the council is increasing parking charges at the height of a serious pandemic when most traders are suffering.
My only concern is that should the current emergency continue into 2021 then shoppers may minimise their visits to shopping centres when they should be encouraged to maintain their shopping activity when businesses are pleading for business.
These car park increases will almost certainly discorage people to come into Dorchester.At this present time the Council should be doing all they can to Encourage shoppers to spend their monies in our wonderful County Town.Do the Council listen their tax payers ? I think not!!!!!!
The amount of shoppers parking in Lyme is limited. Most are parks for tourists . What about Dorset Residents do they not count. £2 for 1 to 1.5 hrs is fair £4 is not.
Hope we will still be able to pay for 1 or 2 hours instead of all day especially west bay
Hopefully this means that East Street car park in Bridport will be resurfaced very soon. The surface is absolutely awful all over and the entrance needs widening. It is very dangerous driving in and out of the car park, and there should be a pedestrian walkway painted to give more guidance.
When I lived in the london borough of hillingdon, before moving here, we had a “hillingdon first” card that entitled us to a reduction in a number of things, including car parking charges, free waste tipping at the local tip, and lower prices for leisure use such as pools, and education at evening classes. The council also negotiated cheaper prices in some shops. Perhaps Dorset could allow local residents the same discounts, it encourages users, but still means that visitors from outside the area pay the higher costs to use our facilities.
I note that once more local people are given no consideration. Would it be so difficult to issue free parking stickers
for the first hour to local people
I thought I elected my councillor to enact the will of the people, not make unilateral decisions that affect half a million people. How is it that one man can create havoc and then announce a further review, just do it in one go, consult and reach an amicable outcome first time around! How did Matt Prosser allow this to happen?
There is no point in having a public consultation over this as Council takes no notice of the results.
I am still extremely concerned about the number of motorvans staying overnight in the Pavilion car park where it states on the notice No Overnight Sleeping. This has been going on the whole summer in large numbers and the Council does not seem able or can’t be bothered to stop this. There were at least 15 vans there one night last week. That was just one night I happened to drive that way. If you aren’t going to stop it then why not send someone down there every morning early before they are moving and collect £10 each a night. That would be £150 most nights in the summer.
The Council should either put a stop to it or make it legal and charge.
It’s an absolute farce at the moment as people are just laughing in your faces!!!
Also I don’t think the charges should be changed from 6pm. People are just coming off the beach and would stay and maybe buy some food if their parking is free from then on.
Can you please confirm that Weymouth car parking is going to be covered by the changes for Dorset. For example, at Dorchester parking charges are £1 for two hours whilst in Weymouth it is £1.60 for one hour. Are charges going to be consolidated across the whole of Dorset?
The longer term plan to make pricing more consistent across the county, but we have not decided how best to implement this. We will be consulting with councillors in the future to determine the best course of action.
You state that the changes to car park charges by including Sundays and extending the hours of charging was “….. made to provide consistency across the Dorset Council area, bringing these car parks into line with other council-run car parks….” Why? There is no logic in this statement.
The increase in hours is also illogical
I am amazed that a single Councillor has made these decisions without pulblic consultation with the Authorities concerned, the public, AND even the other Councillors at Dorset Council. This will not improve the image of Dorset Council one bit.
Charging for car parking on Sundays exceptionally mean. Please re-consider.
Would a shoppers permit cover all towns in Dorset for Dorset residents.
This is the preferred option, yes.
Will the online payment system be the same for all carparks, and will the shoppers permit be incorporated into the system? Can you try to get other local carpark providers to use the same online program. – eg the National Trust uses a different one that won’t download at Studland. Making payment difficult loses revenue!
i am disabled with a blue badge is it possible to stop parking charges for badge holders at this time until the spring next year
I regularly go to Blandford to shop at Morrisons and M&S on a Sunday because parking is free. When Sunday parking charges are introduced it is unlikely I shall continue to shop there. If I have to go to Tesco in order to get free parking I shall most likely go to Fleets Bridge or Tower Park in Poole rather than Tesco in Blandford as these stores offer a much wider choice. Blandford will therefore lose out as far as I am concerned.
“The decision to extend the chargeable period by two hours (from 6pm to 8pm) and to introduce paying to park on Sundays applies to car parks in eight locations: Beaminster, Blandford, Bridport, Dorchester, Gillingham, Shaftesbury, Sherborne and Sturminster Newton”.
So, from the above statement, it is clear that the extension of charges from 6pm to 8pm does not include Weymouth. If this is not the case then the statement is untrue!
You always ignore comments/observations given to you by members of the public particularly from West Dorset.
It doesn’t explain why charges in some areas are much higher than others (Weymouth!) or address the issue of carers not being allowed to obtain permits in areas where they have caring responsibilities.
Sunday and 6 to 8pm charges will probably affect attendances at churches and events or add to on street parking problems, an ill thought out decision with potentially serious consequences. This should have had consultation with local and parish pcouncils.
Don’t agree that this was done and could be done without consultation. Many of us who work in Dorset do not get paid decent wages/salary tho we work in vital industries/services eg I work in care. Tho we have had a 2.75% ‘increase’ in pay this year it doesn’t make up for the years of austerity, and 2.75% on £15.000 a year is so much much less than 2.75% on pay of £70.000, so the divide between the two scales just gets bigger and bigger. So the increase in parking charges affects lower paid people more – tho you say it affects visitors more. Very unhappy.
In Weymouth and Portland a full consultation was made to be consistent with other parts of Dorset and cease parking charges at 6pm so that local businesses would benefit from early evening trade. Now Dorset Council is justifying reversal of this without consultation and justified by consistency with the rest of Dorset.
It is not clear if the charging extension from 6pm to 8pm is just for the 8 locations or whether it applies to Weymouth and Portland and other locations. Badly written.
This change will badly hit those of us resident in the towns with no or insufficient parking who use the (empty) car parks overnight. This takes vehicles off our narrow streets. By charging up to 8 pm and on Sundays I can only imagine the impact of a considerable number of vehicles which will now have to be parked elsewhere. Please reconsider. A ‘unified’ approach in a diverse county is not always the best one.
South Street Dorchester is losing shops rapidly following on from Marks and Spencer leaving. M & Co, Edinburgh Woollen Mills, Peacocks apart from lots of smaller shops. The Council’s answer is to introduce car park charging on Sundays! This will do the remaining shops no good at all. It will also affect elderly and infirm churchgoers.
What planet are the Council on?
This a second attempt to reply. When South Street Dorchester is suffering from an exodus of retail units e.g. Marks and Spencer and shortly Peacocks, Edinburgh Woollen M ill, and M and Co, why introduce charges on a Sunday? There are a host of smaller units also gone on in the last three months.
Add to this the elderly and infirm churchgoers who attend St Peters, the United Church and the Catholic Church, who now will have to pay.
This doesn’t make sense and makes one wonder who the Council is trying to help?
Don’t forget that very soon these same councillors will be knocking on your door asking for for your vote for anther 4 years……..
The changes that the council have recently implemented aren’t justified- charging now on a Sunday will limit attendance at churches as people won’t want to pay for parking just to attend the service, the extension of chargeable hours from 6 to 8 p.m. are also uncalled for as most tourists have gone by about 6 p.m. which just means that they are charging the locals more once again. However the council-wide shoppers’ permit for locals is a good idea and should hopefully boost the local economy in some ways. The car park increases will also discourage people from coming into places such as Dorchester, when they are down on their knees already, without the increased charges.
This is unfair on people who work in Bridport and rely on the parking. £2.80 all day to £6.00 is a massive increase and completely not justified. Why penalise the workers and people who live in Bridport !?
We are developing a new residents permit that should hopefully resolve any issues with residents and workers who use car parks all day. In the meantime, have a look at which permits are available to you at https://www.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk/parking/permits/west-dorset-area/west-dorset-parking-permits.aspx
I am very concerned about the new ways required to pay car park fees. In 2021 it was simple and I was able to purchase an annual short term parking card to show on car. When seeking to renew this I find that the parking machines do not accept cash and I cannot simply renew my card!
I need to use a smart phone(which I do not have or use) with an an app, and (for me) complicated instructions on how to pay to parking fee. As a senior citizen in my eighties, when attempting to do this I usually meet other senior motorists also attempting to park their cars.
I am very concerned that these changes to parking methods are disenfranchising a whole generation of elderly motorists in rural Dorset who rely on their cars for essential transport.
Please, please consider the parking needs of the older generation and provide a simple alternative for them to park legally in Dorset’s car parks.
I am very concerned about the new ways required to pay car park fees. In 2021 it was simple and I was able to purchase an annual short term parking permit to show on car. When seeking to renew this I find that the parking machines do not accept cash and I cannot simply renew my permit! to do this.I need to use a smart phone(which I do not have or use) with an an app, and (for me) complicated instructions on how to pay to parking fee. As a senior citizen in my eighties, when attempting to do this I usually meet other senior motorists also attempting to park their cars.
I am very concerned that these changes to parking methods are disenfranchising a whole generation of elderly motorists in rural Dorset who rely on their cars for essential transport and shopping. I shop in Beaminster, and the wonderful small shops there are dependent on local shoppers.
Please, please consider the parking needs of the older generation and provide a simple alternative for them to park legally in Dorset’s car parks.
Hi Pat – there haven’t been any permanent changes to the way people pay for parking in our car parks recently. You can get a parking permit at https://www.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk/parking/permits/apply-for-a-parking-permit or contact the Parking team at https://www.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk/w/parking-services with any questions – James