"Normandy = less cars more space hence lower charges."
How does that apply in the centre of large towns/cities (Bordeaux/Poitiers/Perigeueux/Paris)? and at coastal resorts - and don't tell me that coastal resorts (Monte Carlo mentioned somewhere above!) are less crowded that in UK!
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Phil
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Population density in UK (INcl Scotland etc) is more than double France.. in 1995
www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/1996/in1.pdf
Since then we have had large scale immigration - into SE England so I suspect it has got worse..
Lots of people, green belt, high land costs, hoarding of land by supermarkets and pension funds... demographics and vested interests mean nowt is cheap...
madf
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I recall a few years ago a local businessman wanted to build a car park opposite his beachfront business. The council rejected his plan and the appeal got rejected also. Then the council built it and charge everyone to use it!
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Just returned to France from a couple of weeks in the UK when I had to remind myself that parking always had to be paid for even at lunchtime and in little towns that you would think would be glad to welcome visitors rather than put them off.
Am I seriously expected to believe that my one pound per hour in many places was financing the Iraq war?
Shakes head in disbelief...
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have a peak at google earth.
contrary to opinion very little of our island is developed. there are massive ares of land with no buildings and no large roads.
house prices too high then build more houses with increased infrastructure.
less than 2 percent of this island is built on
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>less than 2 percent of this island is built on
But we only want to park in about 0.10%, the city centres etc. Not much call for parking spaces out in the cuds. It's a demand/supply thing.
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build more houses with increased infrastructure
Which is why that over the next 10 years at least 3500 houses will be built in my county, they will need roads...
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I would build no more houses. When the crash comes and all the buy-to-let 'investors' get their fingers burned back to their elbows all these new houses won't be needed.
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we have no choice but to build , build build.
even if every town and city increased by 15per cent in volume , with proper transport strategy and better infrastructure we could solve the housing crisis and maybe our children will be able to afford a home when they leave education.
new largeish towns could be built in places like south Essex and Lincolnshire and other rural counties to house tens of thousands of people and these counties have areas 20-30 miles accorss with very little habitation in some parts .
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When the crash comes .
i really cant see a massive crash in the economy coming any time soon.
i a big slowdown maybe but not a big drop. g.brown would never risk that why he is in office.
he'll mess it up just enough to make it happen when a new leader is elected in a few yrs time
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But where to build ? Mrs PU bought a snorkel kit for the Landie in July. Sh has an uncanny knack with these things, more flooding, more misery and more sunken cars.....
For every house they build they reckon on 1.5 cars so that equates to another 5.2k cars in our county.....where are they all going to fit ?
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It's all relative. Parking in Sweden. That's expensive.....
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i very rarely pay to park,ive got it down to an art,however one has to be careful with sharks lurking in the shadows
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There is lots of space to build, but very little common land. If you have flown over the UK on a nice day, you will see that it is almost all fields and scrubland. We think it's built-up because we spend most of our time there.
The roads that are 'concreting over Britain' are really like silken threads on a lawn when views from the air.
Maybe they should build a few more nice towns and cities, with good roads in a block system, but the land is all privately owned and it would be a legal and costly nightmare.
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I think the main difference between France and the UK is that here the local authority has in recent years often received less than its full allocation of central govt funding to carry out its duties hence seeks other ways to raise revenue eg parking charges, charges for planning submissions, section 106 agreements with developers to pay for new roads/schools. It is then a chicken and egg situation - central govt knows that once it has local authorities into the mindset of having to maximise their income elsewhere it can continue to keep them on a tight rein and force them to keep raising revenue elsewhere. Then the govt can say to the electorate that income tax has stayed the same!
France does have higher taxes on employers and employees than we do. I do think as well that the French state for all its overbearing influence appears to be well run - there is a much more developed cadre of professional clerks etc who run the local authorities in France. I am presuming they are given sufficient tax income to spend on infrastructure so do not need to raise parking charges.
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I can't comment on the charges in France, but coach parking in London costs the earth! You car drivers think you've got it bad! It cost me £30 for 12 hours overnight parking and then £6 per hour on Park Lane. Given that I dropped my passengers off at Buckingham Palace at 0930 and wasn't picking them up until 1700 that was another £48. And yes, I know that coaches take up more room, but not that much more!
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It cost me £30 for 12 hours overnight parking and then £6 per hour on Park Lane. Given that I dropped my passengers off at Buckingham Palace at 0930 and wasn't picking them up until 1700
that was another £48. And yes I know that coaches take up more room but not that much more!
I've always wondered about that.......wouldn't it be cheaper for you to drive out to the provinces to park all day and then come back in
up the A5 to say Cricklewood and park in a layby there or in extremis London Gateway services at J3 on the M1. Even in traffic it wouldn't take muck more than an hour (hour and a half for M1 bit) each way,
it would only be the extra diesel then wouldn't it (and stress).
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I would do that, Westy (if I may be so bold) but there's the risk that I'll be held up in traffic on the way back in to pick up and face the wrath of 49 elderly people - especially if it's persisting down!
The problem with using a service area is that you're restricted to two hours parking - after that you have to pay.
I should point out that I don't actually pay for the parking in the long run - my boss does - but it still leaves me wondering whether the authorities in London actually want coaches in their city.
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Oh, and driving out to the provinces would add time to my driving hours for the day (I can only drive 10 max) and probably affect the journey home.
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"less than 2 percent of this island is built on"
Where does this figure come from -
According to DEFRA the percentage of urbanised land in England in 1991 was 10.60% and I dont think it will have shrunk much in the past 16 years. As Joni Mitchell sang:
"They paved paradise, they put up a parking lot." :D
www.defra.gov.uk/environment/statistics/land/lduse...m
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I usually don't park exactly at the shopping/multiplex etc. Park in a residential area little further and walk to destination.
However, in my recent Pembrokeshire trip, this trick didn't work! As soon as I appeard in a beach, someone with yellow jacket popped up from nowhere and asked £2.50 to £3.00 to park (irrespective of any duration). Since the beaches in South Wales are often too far from residential areas, I had no choice but to fork out the money :(
£3 for 30 minutes really hurts!
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"less than 2 percent of this island is built on" Where does this figure come from - According to DEFRA the percentage of urbanised land in England in 1991 was 10.60% and I dont think it will have shrunk much in the past 16 years.
'This island' presumably includes Wales and Scotland, which I would imagine have a lower proportion of built up areas overall - with obvious exceptions in S. Wales and Central Scotland.
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If all the towns in London and the sout-east doubled the amount of parking, you'd never be able to get there because the roads would be even more jammed.
It's a "new day" in the south east, you can't shove never ending new cars, houses & people in the same space and expect things not to change.
Parking is a scare commodity, and it's price will continue to increase in the future IMHO.
MVP
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We went to Southport on Bank Holiday Monday. Followed the council signs that said "Park and Ride £1". Got there, got up to the booth, there is a sign saying "£3" and the bloke says there are no buses.
Drove into the centre and parked at the retail park, which was cheaper.
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Hi Tintin01,
Was it the park and ride by the new Splash World, with a big modern looking wood-clad building with a wind turbine on top? This one is closed on a Bank Holiday to provide parking for the fair/seafront. However if you head past this one towards the beach, turn right at the roundabout, go over a mini-roundabout, under the Pier, straight on at the roundabout and right at the next roundabout then you'll come to Southport's second park and ride site. Also, from November, there's a brand new park and ride opening on the eastern approach from Ormskirk, behind the B&Q on the big roundabout.
Incidentally, you can park on the retail centre (Ocean Plaza) car park (the one by Matalan) for free for two hours. Handy if you want to go for a bracing walk along the Pier! Make sure you display a ticket though.
Alternatively, you're welcome to use my drive - only five minutes from the beach! :-)
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I think that is part of the bigger problem - if car parking charges weren't so high then everyone would want to drive into towns and we would have total gridlock.
I used to work in Supermarkets so always had plenty of free parking at my place of work. I now work in centre of Glasgow but can use the work's car park as I use my car for work and am in/out all day. However I am totally gobsmacked with the amount of cars that sit by the parking meters and get their meters fed all day long. I am right next to an underground and you are not telling me that all these people could not use public transport?
And I won't even go on to rant about the local NHS deciding to impose parking charges at the hospital where my wife works......... (not accessible by public transport!)
--
2007 Seat Altea XL 2.0 TDI (140) Stylance
2005 Skoda Fabia vrS
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I think that is part of the bigger problem - if car parking charges weren't so high then everyone would want to drive into towns and we would have total gridlock.
But then it's a vicious circle. Keep people out of towns and town centres will not survive. Tescos or similar will carry on stocking everything we need under one roof with easy free parking out of town.
I see the problem where I live, Eastbourne, as an infrastructure problem. The roads haven't been improved as the size of the town has increased and now due to devlopment over a number of years the roads can't be improved unless you compulsory purchase a large number of houses and run the roads out that way.
So, how are they going to solve it? The council is just about to do away with free parking (2-hr and unrestricted) in the town centre area to try and reduce traffic entering the town (oh, and it'll raise a little bit of cash for them to put into the town's public transport.... ;-)
Chris
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Yes, it was that car park in Southport, near the pleasure beach. We did end up near Matalan - quite impressed at 2 hours free parking. Had lunch at the Prince of Wales (?) hotel, 3 course carvery for around £6.
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You can't argue with that! Hope you aren't put off coming back to Southport. It's the Airshow soon - well worth a visit. If you need to know about the best place to park, feel free to ask the mods to pass on my email address. I'd be glad to help.
Cheers.
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But then it's a vicious circle. Keep people out of towns and town centres will not survive. Tescos or similar will carry on stocking everything we need under one roof with easy free parking out of town.
Chris
It's easy to jump to conclusions.
More and more people are actually living in inner city areas so town centres are booming. The big growth area for supermarkets, in recent years, have been the smaller 'Tesco Metro' type shops in the city centre.
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Incidentally you can park on the retail centre (Ocean Plaza) car park (the one by Matalan) for free for two hours.
Ah, Ocean Plaza. Pretty much sums up why they now call Southport the Venice of the North.
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Ocean Plaza. We have lost it in this Country since when was the Irish Sea an Ocean ?!!! I ask you.
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Think I must be missing something there - drove down the coastal road before and you couldn't even see the sea on the horizon! Or are you referring to the smell? ;-)
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"drove down the coastal road before and you couldn't even see the sea on the horizon!"
Ah, me bhoy, twas ever thus.
JMO, but the inaptly/ineptly named Ocean Plaza is one of the worst eyesores ever visited on Southport. Every time I see it I wonder what drugs the designers had been taking. Probably crack.
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Stayed a few nights in East Lothian, Scotland, was surprised to find I could park in the town centre streets and not be charged for the privilege. ,There were even car parks provided free.
And for some reason the Scottish version of national newspapers were cheaper than in England !!.
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Thanks, Badwolf; we really like Southport - usually combine it with a trip to see the red squirells at Formby. Our kids love the old amusement machines on the pier, except the woman in there is a bit grumpy. I am looking forward to the tide being in one day when we go.
Housing shortage? I would tax buy-to-let. If they build all these thousands of houses we need, they will be bought up by buy-to-letters withdrawing equity from their other properties which have gone up x4 in the last 15 years.
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You think car parking is expensive, try parking an articulated lorry for the night.
Motorway Service stations charge us anything from £15 to £25 for a night and SOME bosses pay us that back but others expect that to come out of our £20 average per night 'Night Out Money' paid to reimburse us for having to buy meals out and pay for showers etc.
Then we find that the facilities are closed at 10pm and not open when we leave early in the morning and there is no security.
So invariably we wake up to find our trailer curtains slashed, deisel stolen and are told that we 'park at our own risk'.
Yet in EU Countries we park for free and are safe?????
Pat
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Parking charges must depend largely on the cost of land, and the extent to which it has to produce an income. In the East Lindsey area of Lincolnshire the charge is 60p for 1 hour rising to £1.80 for 10 hours, in properly surfaced and marked out council carparks. Annual tickets are £180.
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L\'escargot.
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I have just come back from a pleasant 3 days in Brugge. Centrally located hotel offered parking in an individual locked garage for £5 a night. Stansted Mid Term Car Park = £13.80 per 24 hours, 10 minute bus ride to the terminal. Frankfurt Hahn has Long stay parking, a walk from the terminal at 40 euros for the first week and the 25 euros for the second! UK Motorists are the cash cows of the government and local authorities. Public transport in rural areas doesn't exist or isn't convenient so many of us have to use our cars and are fleeced for privilege. We are now regarded as a legitimate source of cash flow and what we pay probably saves the government from putting another 2p in the £ on income tax.
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Parking charges must depend largely on the cost of land and the extent to which it has to produce an income.
Although that wouldn't apply to roadside parking.
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Although that wouldn't apply to roadside parking.
Having had an 18-month old car (parked in a 30 mph zone) run into by a passing lunatic, and which cost half the value of the car to repair, I now wouldn't park on the road for all the tea in China.
--
L\'escargot.
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