Canterbury parking prices increased

Canterbury City Council has agreed to 25% increase in parking fees for the central carparks of Canterbury.

From next month anyone using Canterbury’s central car park will have to pay a hefty £2.80 an hour.

As of the 1st of April, users of Pound Lane car park will have to pay 70p extra than before.

This price increase is one of the revenue-boosting measures signed off in the city council’s annual agreement budget last week.

Whitefriars, Pound Lane, St Radigunds, Longport, North Lane, Millers Field, Northgate and Castle Row will go up 30p to £2.30.

Prices in Station Road West, Castle Street and Holmans Meadow will be lowered to £1.80 per hour. This is in an attempt to increase the usage of car parks on the further away from the city centre.

The popular Park and Ride service will also see an increase in price going from £3.50 to £4 per day.

Blue Badge holders will also now have only two hours free parking rather than three. But, this debate has sparked worries that this will cause more people to park on double yellow lines.

Overall, these price changes are an attempt to tackle the financial crisis Covid has left the city in.

There will be other changes throughout the city too including:

• Unspecified public toilets will be shut down and café and weddings functions from Kings Hall will be removed.
• Tower House in Westgate Gardens will be leased to a private operator, burial fees will rise and maintenance and repairs on cycle paths will be cut back.
• The average council tax bill will be increased by £4.95.

The council predicts that it could make an additional £30,000 by making these changes. This will help to tackle the £9 million deficit the pandemic caused.

Cllr Rachel Carnac, the authority’s leading member for finance, told Kent Online: “It’s a fair and responsible budget. It’s a balanced budget and we will start to stabilise our finances, build back our reserves and transform the council into a more efficient operation.”

But opposition Labour leader Cllr Alan Baldock was not convinced. He told Kent Online: “All I see is a budget that is patching up the consequences for the failure of 10 years of Tory austerity and numerous bad local decisions that bought this council to its knees under the pressures of Covid.”

Featured picture: Charlotte Barcham