Marlborough Town Council have made available details of Wiltshire Council’s latest draft proposal regarding which areas of currently free parking will go.
Click on the map below to enlarge the full detailed plan:
The North side of the High Street appears to be largely unaffected, only the spaces outside ASK / Bunces / Prezzo and outside the Royal Oak / WH Smiths are to go, whereas on the South side it’s only the spaces outside Waitrose and to the East of Alma Place (and the single space adjacent to One Stop) that stay.
All existing Bus Stops, Disabled spaces and Taxi Spaces will remain unaffected other than the Disabled space adjacent to the Wellington Arms. The loss of this spot is contrary to the Town Council’s vote to ensure that all Disabled spaces stay as they are.
The final plan hasn’t been agreed yet. It will be discussed at tonight’s meeting of the full Town Council, although the current position of the Town Council is that their earlier decision to do away with all free parking still stands unless they decide to revoke at some point which will require a new proposal and vote. Ultimately, it appears that the final decision will rest with Wiltshire Council.
Also to be discussed are the measures to ‘soften’ the impact of the loss of the free spaces, which at present centres on offering a number of free spaces in car parks on certain days, an allocation that the Town Council has at its disposal to provide as and when deemed necessary.
There is also a ‘fee redemption’ proposal, whereby the first hour charge for a parking space can be recovered by presenting a section of the parking ticket to a participating retailer, who will then take that off the bill when a purchase is made. But this will take a while to implement, once approved, so will not be part of the immediate ‘Safe Re-opening of The High Street’ project.
