Agenda item

Purpose of Report

To seek Executive’s approval to make a formal request to the County Council as Local Highway Authority for the extension of the recently introduced Residents Parking Scheme in Sincil Bank.

Decision

That a formal submission to the County Council requesting an extension of the current RPS zones into zones 5E and F in Sincil Bank be approved.

Alternative Options Considered and Rejected

None. Not requesting the County Council pursue the RPS extension would mean that residents on these streets continued to suffer with undue commuter parking pressure. This could also lead to a loss in the sense of community ownership and pride of the street when parking was dominated by non-residents that changed day to day, preventing residents form parking close to their home.

Reasons for the Decision

The provision of adequate and efficient parking in the City was crucial in helping ensure Lincoln successfully continued in its role as the key urban centre for Lincolnshire and the wider area. Resident Parking Schemes (RPS) provided a key component to balancing the requirement to provide visitor parking whilst safeguarding adequate provision for residents of a number of our more central wards.

This report identified areas where there was evidence for the extension of the Resident Parking Scheme in the Sincil Bank area. It set out the process for pursuing this, and the costs involved.

In 2018 the City of Lincoln Council sought to create an RPS scheme in Sincil Bank. This originally included zones 5B, C, D, E and F. Following engagement with the County Council they determined that at that time the scheme was too large to implement in one go. Consequently, zones 5B, C, D were implemented on the understanding that it was likely to expand into zones 5E and F post implementation.

Since implementation, several enquiries from both Ward Members and local residents regarding the potential extension of the scheme had been received, citing increased non-resident parking on the streets within zones 5E and F. The City Council therefore commissioned survey work on the remaining zones 5E and F to understand the impact on these areas now the earlier zones had been operating for some time.

As could be seen in the survey results at Appendix 1, officers considered there was sufficient an impact on the streets within the proposed zones 5E and F to make a formal request of the Highway Authority to consider expanding the RPS to include these areas. This evidence would appear to substantiate the anecdotal feedback received from Ward Members and a number of residents within these zones regarding commuter parking.

The results had been shared and discussed with the Council’s Portfolio Holder for Economic Growth who agreed that the evidence supported pursuing the RPS expansion. Officers at the Highway Authority had therefore been informally contacted with the survey results and had raised no objections at this stage.

If a formal request to extend the RPS was submitted to the County Council they would conduct a local referendum covering the affected zones and would need at least 51% of responding residents to vote in favour of the scheme before it could be implemented, and ultimately the formal decision would be made by the relevant committee within the County Council.

Members requested that in the event residents in these areas had the opportunity to vote on the RPS extension should the County Council conduct a local referendum of the affected zones; all groups of people should be included in the consultation taking into account the diverse make-up of the local community and any potential impacts of language barrier.