Agenda item

Council Car Parking charges in Town and District Centres

This Council Meeting:

 

·           Recognises the Greater Manchester Business Survey‘s findings that high parking charges are a negative feature of Stockport’s local economy.

·           Realises the importance of low, competitive parking charges to encourage residents to shop locally, support Stockport’s businesses and help reduce the number of empty shops in the town centre.

·           Welcomes the well-intentioned and overdue decision to introduce an hourly parking charge to encourage short stay visits in specific car parks.

·           Notes that this decision follows the demands of some local traders and the urging of the Conservative Group at the previous Council Meeting for charges to be reduced.

·           Regrets that once again there is no properly targeted strategy in place to use limited free parking to specifically drive additional footfall in the District Centres.

·           Urges the Council Executive to correct the anomalies which mean a number of two or three hour stays are now more expensive in car parks across the borough, to provide some limited time’s free parking in district centres and to ensure that low, shopper and business friendly, parking charges remain a priority.  

 

Moved by:                  Councillor Paul Bellis

Seconded by:           Councillor Lisa Walker

Minutes:

MOVED AND SECONDED - This Council Meeting:

 

·           Recognises the Greater Manchester Business Survey‘s findings that high parking charges are a negative feature of Stockport’s local economy.

·           Realises the importance of low, competitive parking charges to encourage residents to shop locally, support Stockport’s businesses and help reduce the number of empty shops in the town centre.

·           Welcomes the well-intentioned and overdue decision to introduce an hourly parking charge to encourage short stay visits in specific car parks.

·           Notes that this decision follows the demands of some local traders and the urging of the Conservative Group at the previous Council Meeting for charges to be reduced.

·           Regrets that once again there is no properly targeted strategy in place to use limited free parking to specifically drive additional footfall in the District Centres.

·           Urges the Council Executive to correct the anomalies which mean a number of two or three hour stays are now more expensive in car parks across the borough, to provide some limited time’s free parking in district centres and to ensure that low, shopper and business friendly, parking charges remain a priority.

 

AMENDMENT MOVED AND SECONDED - Delete all after “This Council Meeting” and replace with:

 

“recognises the Greater Manchester Business Survey’s findings that more businesses are satisfied (and fewer are dissatisfied) with the availability of parking in Stockport than across Greater Manchester.

This Council Meeting notes:

 

  • that the Survey makes no reference whatsoever to parking charges; and
  • the incorrect reference to parking charges contained in the resume of the Stockport Economic Alliance Task Force meeting in February that was considered by the Environment and Economy Scrutiny Committee on 21st March 2013.

 

This Council Meeting regrets that this mistake was repeated in the original version of this motion.

 

This Council Meeting welcomes the Concluding Report of the GM Town Centres Project, considered by the GM Combined Authority on 11th March 2013 which highlights car parking across Greater Manchester as “a common issue with different responses in different town centres”.

 

This Council Meeting further notes that the Concluding Report observes that “Reliable evidence on the impact and importance of free parking/reduced fees, and any measurable benefits to town centre businesses, needs to be collected by Districts and shared”, which will “enable individual Districts to make more informed decisions locally.

 

This Council Meeting therefore resolves to continue to participate fully with our GM partners to learn lessons from their schemes to ensure that any future free parking or reduced fee schemes have the best chance of achieving benefits for town and district centre businesses.”

 

For the Amendment 29, against 9,

 

AMENDMENT CARRIED.

 

The amendment was then put as the substantive motion and it was

 

RESOLVED – (28 for, 23 against) - This Council Meeting recognises the Greater Manchester Business Survey’s findings that more businesses are satisfied (and fewer are dissatisfied) with the availability of parking in Stockport than across Greater Manchester.

This Council Meeting notes:

 

  • that the Survey makes no reference whatsoever to parking charges; and
  • the incorrect reference to parking charges contained in the resume of the Stockport Economic Alliance Task Force meeting in February that was considered by the Environment and Economy Scrutiny Committee on 21st March 2013.

 

This Council Meeting regrets that this mistake was repeated in the original version of this motion.

 

This Council Meeting welcomes the Concluding Report of the GM Town Centres Project, considered by the GM Combined Authority on 11th March 2013 which highlights car parking across Greater Manchester as “a common issue with different responses in different town centres”.

 

This Council Meeting further notes that the Concluding Report observes that “Reliable evidence on the impact and importance of free parking/reduced fees, and any measurable benefits to town centre businesses, needs to be collected by Districts and shared”, which will “enable individual Districts to make more informed decisions locally”.

 

This Council Meeting therefore resolves to continue to participate fully with our GM partners to learn lessons from their schemes to ensure that any future free parking or reduced fee schemes have the best chance of achieving benefits for town and district centre businesses.