The county-wide consultation on car parking has begun with a meeting at the Town Hall on Monday (November 10) and the issue of a bundle of documents by Wiltshire Council.
Among these is the “Marlborough Town Council Profile – Consultation Draft”. This contains loads of interesting statistics. But also includes an extraordinary economic analysis of what they term ‘Town centre leakage’ that has affected the level of trade in the High Street.
On the local level they put the alleged under-performance of the High Street at the door of Waitrose: “The primary reason for this under performance appears to be the apparent under-trading of the key anchor store in the centre: Waitrose.”
“This store, located on High Street, has a turnover of £20.6m which falls short of the £26.6m turnover we would expect based on average levels.”
Why these 2011 figures were used is not clear. They may not even be accurate for 2011. A local Waitrose representative told Marlborough News Online he was “very surprised” by the statement and figures in the report. The branch’s turnover is currently “in excess” of the £26.6m figure.
The Profile goes on to say of Waitrose that the Council would “expect the store in the town centre to benefit from lunch/visitor trade “ – but they admit this may not have been picked up in the ‘household survey’ on which these paragraphs are apparently based.
In fact since the 2011 refit and the larger display of lunchtime foods and sandwiches by the main entrance, the store’s busiest period is 11.00am to 1.00pm and the sale of sandwiches has increased.
As we went in to see Waitrose management, a woman shopper asked why we were taking photographs of the parking notices. When told there was a consultation starting on parking charges she responded: “Oh good – does that mean we’ll get free parking for Waitrose – like at Newbury?”
Unfortunately not. It would be uneconomic for Waitrose to subsidise shoppers’ parking at the level of Wiltshire’s charges. The Hilliers Yard/Waitrose car park is owned by Waitrose, but leased to Wiltshire Council on a long lease.
The report also gives a rap on the Town Council’s knuckles for not participating in a ‘town benchmarking’ operation to collect data on performance indicators that was offered by Wiltshire Council: “Marlborough Town Council declined the opportunity to participate and therefore the data found in other towns’ reports cannot be provided.” It does not mention what the cost of this exercise would have been.
Putting aside these and wider ‘strategic’ issues, Marlborough has to respond to Wiltshire Council’s proposed suggested increase in charges for some of the town’s car parks.
In essence this means that two of the most used off-street parking places would change from Long Stay to Short Stay – with a three hour limit.
These would be the Hilliers Yard (or Waitrose) car park and the adjacent Polly Gardens car park.
Charges in these car parks would rise: for one hour from 55p to 60p and for two hours from £1.30 to £1.40. The charge for three hours would remain at £3.30. The increases are “to help manage demand.”
The High Street charges would remain the same. Though the claim that the usage of these spaces is only 77 per cent at peak times will raise some eyebrows.
George Lane and Kennet Place remain Long Stay parks, but the cost of the first hour rises to 60p. And the charge for a full day drops by 10p to £6.00 and starts after five hours – the eight hour tariff is abolished.
Hyde Lane is treated the same as George Lane and Kennet Place except that the first and second hours both increase by 10p – again “to help manage demand.”
Charges for coaches parking in the George Lane car park would not change.
The consultation states that “You are invited to propose alternative changes and explain how it [sic] may be funded.” So it is unlikely they will pay any attention to complaints about the changes that do not include funding solutions.
Amongst the seven Wiltshire Council run car parks in the town only one is being treated differently: that is the car park at Savernake Hospital which will remain long stay with the same charges. But ominously the consultation questionnaire goes on: “After reviewing this car park, the Council feel that alternative management models (e.g. community managed) or other uses for the site should be explored.”
To lob this into the debate about parking in Marlborough is really very strange. As Wiltshire Council well know, the hospital is owned by Great Western Hospitals Foundation Trust and one would expect their input into the consultation to be paramount.
Can it be that the Council believe this car park is under used? Or does ‘other uses’ imply that the Council believe the Hospital does not need a car park? They surely know that parking at Savernake Hospital is at such a premium that staff have to park their cars at the football ground and are then ferried up to the hospital by minibus.
The President of the Marlborough Chamber of Commerce, Alex Minoudis, told Marlborough News Online that the proposed 5p increases for the two new short stay car parks was ‘not as bad as we had expected, especially as it is the first increase for four years’ and he hoped the limit to three hours parking would keep footfall flowing.
He also commented: “We are pleased to see that there are no proposed changes to parking arrangements in Marlborough High Street. The 30 minutes of free car parking offered on the sides of the High Street are vital to encourage pop-in trade.”
“We are disappointed not to see any consideration given to lower tariffs at our long stay car parks. The reduction from £6.10 to £6 a day at George Lane, Hyde Lane and Kennet Place will do little to help the lowest paid workers in jobs like retail and administration.”
Mr Minoudis’ was concerned about the tariff for visiting coaches: “We are also disappointed to see no consideration to waiving the fees at the coach park. This is a major tenet of our bid towards becoming a ‘Coach Friendly Town’, and the income generated in the local economy by coach visitors far outweighs the benefits of revenue from charging coaches to stop in Marlborough.”
The Marlborough part of the consultation can be accessed at Wiltshire Council’s consultation portal.
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